


Mental

by error404_happinessnotfound



Category: Monsta X (Band)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Horror, Insanity, Mental Anguish, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, Mental Institutions, Mystery, Narcolepsy, Psychological Horror, Psychological Trauma, Schizophrenia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-21
Updated: 2019-01-12
Packaged: 2019-09-23 18:49:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 83
Words: 71,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17085743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/error404_happinessnotfound/pseuds/error404_happinessnotfound
Summary: "one person's craziness is another person's reality." -tim burton//"I'm scared.""Of what?""Of being alone.""Why?""Because I can't tell what's real and what's fake when I'm by myself."





	1. Chapter 1

"And now, because the author has decided to start the novel with a cliche plot device, let me introduce our new transfer student," the teacher drawled before knocking twice against the door.

After a moment, it slid open from the outside, and in stepped a tall, lanky student.

Kihyun, from the back of the class, squinted at the newcomer. The class wasn't geometry, Kihyun was pretty sure it was actually supposed to be physics, but he couldn't help but analyze how angular the kid was. His joints stuck out sharply in a manner that made Kihyun wince. While most of his limbs protruded from his body, the one exception was the boy's eyes, which appeared to be sunken slightly into his head and underscored by dark marks.

While the gaunt, skeleton-like frame would have appeared unnatural and possibly even horrifying on anyone else, it seemed to suit the boy.

Kihyun didn't know if he liked the boy or not. Usually he could tell right away.

"Your new classmate is Chae Hyungwon." The teacher turned to the side, looking at the transfer. "Please introduce yourself."

The boy swallowed uncomfortably, his fingers scratching at his shirt cuffs, which were white. Their uniforms were all white.

"I'm Chae-" he began, but before he could finish, he blinked, his mouth opening, and then his eyes rolled back into his head and he collapsed on the floor.

 _Must be pretty light,_ Kihyun reasoned.  _He didn't make much of a sound when he hit the ground._

Which made sense, Kihyun figured, given how skinny the boy was.

The teacher just sighed, massaging his forehead. "Minhyuk, Hyungwon is your seat partner. Please help him into his seat."

"Yes, sir," Minhyuk said before bounding out of his seat and over to the unconscious boy sprawled across the white-tiled floor. "Yo, Jooheon, help a brother out here."

Jooheon squinted before nodding, getting up from his desk and helping Minhyuk wrestle Hyungwon into his desk. Then Minhyuk and Jooheon both took their respective seats, glancing over at the new transfer student with slight curiosity.

Only slight curiosity, though, because they knew the drill. Chances were, he'd be gone in less than two months. Fixed, just like that.

Kihyun also squinted at the back of the boy's head.

 _Is he a threat to me?_ Kihyun asked himself.  _Was he glaring at me earlier? Is that what he was doing? But why does he have a problem with me? Unless he knew I was here and he came here especially for me. But why? To kill me? Maybe. It's possible. Although he doesn't look like a killer. But looks can be deceiving. I know that better than anyone. So maybe he really is here to hurt me. But the administration wouldn't let him register if they knew he was going to hurt me, right? Unless...unless they want me gone too. I have to consider that. In which case I'm truly fucked because I have no way out. If they want me dead, dead is exactly what I'm going to be. But I've got to try. Gotta stay on my toes. Can't let them get me. Can't let anyone get me. But is that boy really working with the administration? He doesn't look strong enough to hurt anyone. But then again... Maybe he's the wiry-strong type. Looks harmless, can lift a car. I can't be too safe. Gotta keep my distance just in case. Unless...unless the administration is out to get me and he's not out to get me. Maybe then, he can be an ally...but what if he rats me out? What if he betrays me? I can't let that happen. I have to... I have to-_

"Yo, Kihyun," came a sharp whisper from his right, and Kihyun looked over.

"What do you want, Shownu?" Kihyun whispered back, eyeing the teacher, whose back was to them.

"Nothing, you just looked-" Shownu cut himself, trying not to upset Kihyun since he was easily upset. "What day is today?" he asked instead in a gentler tone.

"Monday," Kihyun replied before nodding slowly. "Which means-"

"We have another new student today," the teacher said, sighing. "Come on in," he called, and a shorter but more well-built boy entered the classroom, averting eye contact. "Shin Hoseok, please introduce yourself."

Hoseok looked over at the teacher in confusion. "Who's Shin Hoseok?"

The teacher waited a long moment before sighing and gesturing vaguely. "Just- introduce yourself, as usual."

 _As usual?_ Wonho wondered before shrugging and turning to face the class. He met someone's eyes on accident and flushed, looking down quickly and fiddling with his fingers. "H-Hi, I'm Jay Park," he mumbled.

Kihyun snorted from the back of the room.  _So he's Jay Park now, huh? That's certainly an upgrade. Who was he last week? Some supposed ramen shop owner?_

"All right, Hos- Jay, why don't you take your seat," the teacher said, adjusting his glasses, and Hoseok looked over at the teacher, concerned.

"But which seat is mine?" he asked, and the teacher opened his mouth.

"The same seat as alw-" He huffed. "The one next to Chankgyun."

"But...but who is Changkyun?"

Changkyun rose his hand from the back, his hand shaking slightly, and his eyes darted up to the ceiling before he dropped his hand and looked over at Jooheon in the seat across from him. "They're in the ceiling, man. They'll suck your blood out." He sank lower into his sink, eyeing the ceiling nervously, his eyes shifting and never stopping in one particular place. "They're everywhere, man."

"You're whack," Jooheon replied simply, rolling his eyes. Everyone knew better than to believe Changkyun, who was always spouting off about monsters that were out there to kill them. Each week it was a new monster.

Although, who were they to call him crazy?

Wonho nodded slowly before sitting down next to Changkyun, extending a hand to shake. "Hi, I'm Jay," he said with a nervous smile, hoping he'd fit in here.

Changkyun just stared at his hand in horror.

"What is it this time?" Jooheon asked, leaning closer. "Microscopic leeches that'll burrow into your bloodstream and suck the marrow out of your bones? Invisible carnivorous fish that subside in your sweat?"

"No," Changkyun said, leaning back away from Wonho's outstretched hand. "Germs."

"Oh. S-Sorry..." Wonho said, chuckling nervously and wiping his palm on his pants.

 _Why do I have to be here?_  he wondered before scanning the room for his future classmates, noticing that one of them was lying on his desk, eyes closed. _Pretty brazen of him, sleeping in class when there are only seven of us here...What kind of school is this anyways?_


	2. Chapter 2

"You have one hour," the teacher announced before gathering his belongings and exiting the classroom. By this point in time, Hyungwon was just starting to stir.

"Hey, newbie," Minhyuk said, grinning and leaning in close to Hyungwon's face.

Hyungwon blinked, pulling his head back and wincing.

"It's lunchtime," Minhyuk said. "Are you hungry?" Minhyuk paused. "Well, you sort of have to eat anyway or they'll put it on your report that you didn't eat and you'll get a demerit or something. And just so you know, just because the teacher's not here doesn't mean anything, they've got-"

"They've got cameras," Kihyun said from the back of the classroom, his eyes marking the corners of the room. "They're watching us, all the time, watching us from their screens."

"Exactly," Minhyuk said, smiling. "Couldn't have phrased it better myself. But since it's basically free time, we usually push our desks into a circle so we can all talk. Are you cool with that?"

After a slight pause, Hyungwon bobbed his head forward and followed Minhyuk's lead, dragging his desk over to form a connected circle. The only difference was that Minhyuk let the metal chair legs screech against the ground while Hyungwon subtly picked up his desk to avoid causing the awful noise.

"So," Jooheon began, taking a bite of the lunch that had been provided for each of them on black trays. "The passing out thing. Is that some sort of party trick or what?"

Hyungwon shifted uncomfortably, adjusting the collar of his uniform. "No."

Wonho looked up at the other boy, confused why everyone was treating him like an outsider.

"He's new," Shownu explained, taking sympathy on Wonho instead of acting fed up with him like everyone else.

"Oh," Wonho said, pretending like that explained everything, but it didn't.  _I'm new too, so why are they treating him differently?_

"What's wrong with you then?" Changkyun asked, ignoring Wonho, and Wonho frowned.

"Hey now," Minhyuk said, draping an arm across Hyungwon's shoulders without asking.

Hyungwon looked uncomfortable.

"You're all going to scare him off. Remember the last guy?"

They all sighed. Life was boring. New blood meant new drama. And when they scared off the new kids, they took the excitement with them.

"Besides," Minhyuk went on. "Who better to understand a messed-up guy than six other messed-up guys?"

Wonho raised an unsure hand. "I'm sorry, I don't follow...isn't this supposed to be a school? A boarding school of some sort? Because...I'm not...I don't know what you mean about being messed-up, I'm just a normal kid, so...so I don't know if I'm supposed to be here-"

"It's a school where they throw kids who aren't all there," Jooheon said.

"Different," Changkyun added.

"Crazy," Kihyun said, and the room grew silent.

"But I'm not- I'm not crazy," Wonho said, casting a nervous glance at he boys around him. Maybe they deserved to be here, but he sure didn't.

"We know why you're here," Jooheon said sharply before looking over at Hyungwon. "But why are you here?"

Hyungwon said nothing, staring down at his food.

The room was quiet.

Then, "Is he going to pass out again?" Changkyun whispered.

Hyungwon looked up with a grimace on his face. He looked slightly upset, but not in an angry way. "It's called narcolepsy. I'm narcoleptic. I don't control it. It just happens."

Jooheon mulled it over for a second before leaning back in his chair, crossing his arms with a scowl on his face. "So you're not crazy."

He may as well have said  _You're not one of us._

Hyungwon flinched but didn't reply.

"What the hell," Jooheon muttered, rolling his eyes.

"Jooheon-" Shownu began, but the other boy glared at him.

"Don't say anything, Shownu. You know how this goes. They're going to expect us to play nicely with him, but he's not one of us. He doesn't belong here."

Hyungwon sat silently while they argued around him. He wanted to say,  _I didn't belong_ there _, either_ , but he stayed quiet. Talking wouldn't do anything. It only got him into trouble.

It was why he was sitting in a desk, wearing a white uniform, and trying to eat food he didn't want to eat.

Hyungwon slowly lifted a hand to his neck, his index finger hovering just above his pulse, but he dropped his hand before he made contact.

From across the room, Wonho stared at the quiet boy.

 _I'm normal too_ , Wonho thought to himself.  _I don't belong here either._

_So why are they only telling it to him?_

_Why am I here?_

_I'm not crazy, either._

_...right?_


	3. Chapter 3

"We each have a roommate," Minhyuk explained to Hyungwon after the school part of their day was finished. For one reason or another, possibly because they were deskmates, Minhyuk had taken the role of Hyungwon's tour guide. He was both effervescent and physically affectionate, often putting his arm around Hyungwon or patting his back, and Hyungwon was comfortable with neither.

"They can't let us room alone because, you know," Minhyuk continued, oblivious to Hyungwon's quiet discomfort. "They don't want us to kill ourselves or something. But if they put all of us in the same room, we might cause trouble or just drive ourselves closer to the edge-"

Hyungwon wasn't exactly sure what edge Minhyuk was talking about.

"-so there's just two to a room. But it's hard figuring out who rooms together because, well, I mean, you wouldn't want to put Changkyun and Kihyun in the same room because they'd probably end up crazier than they are already. It has to do with mental compatibility, really. Shownu's pretty good at calming Jooheon down - you'll see what I mean later - so they room together. And I know Jooheon seems like an asshole and I'm supposed to make some excuse for him but that's usually just how he is, you get used to it." Minhyuk paused as though recounting his train of thought. "Okay, so Shownu and Jooheon, right, and then I room with Changkyun. He's a nice guy once you get past all the stuff he's always spouting off about. But do me a favor, yeah? And don't, you know, patronize him. He doesn't like it when people act like he's stupid. He's crazy, yeah, but we all are, and we gotta look out for each other, you know? No need to hurt the poor kid's feelings."

Hyungwon nodded because he sensed that Minhyuk wanted him to.

"Good. And Kihyun - do you remember him? - he rooms with Wonho. But since you're here now...hmm...maybe one of the rooms will have three? They don't like leaving us alone..."

"Isn't-" Hyungwon had to pause to clear his throat. "Isn't Wonho new too?" He paused. "I thought...isn't his name Jay? Why does everyone-"

"He's new, and he's not new," Minhyuk said with a crooked grin, still walking fast, but Hyungwon didn't have to work very hard to keep up since his legs were a foot longer than Minhyuk's. "Jay's new, Wonho's not. Wonho's been here a long time. Like me!" He grinned. "It's a funny place to think of as home, but there isn't anywhere else for kids like us, really. You make do however you can."

"Is he...I don't understand," Hyungwon said, Minhyuk's cryptic explanation having cleared up absolutely nothing. "Is he Wonho, or is he Jay?" He paused, remembering vague phrases from movies and textbooks. "Or...or both? Does he have multiple personalities?"

"It's called dissociative identity disorder if you want to slap a name on it," Minhyuk said brusquely. "But we don't like names here. Labels. Some empty form to fill in with your information. We're people, not disorders."

Hyungwon slowed down, a bit frightened, as it was the first time he'd seen Minhyuk display negative energy all day.

"But, what the hell, it doesn't matter," Minhyuk said with a blinding smile, and that scared Hyungwon more, the shift from extreme to extreme. "He doesn't have it. He's not both; he's just Jay right now and then he'll be someone else later, but he's always Wonho." Minhyuk smiled, tilting his head to the right. "And Wonho is always nice, no matter who he is. That's how you know that it's Wonho. I already told you, names don't matter here. Sure, maybe to the doctors or the people watching us on their screens, but not to us. We're just kids. Call it whatever you want. I don't care if you call yourself narcowhatever or not. I'm not the one figuring out what drugs to put you on to make everything go away, I'm just trying to get by myself, and I could care less about what your diagnosis is."

Hyungwon supposed that it made sense. And he knew well enough for himself that not every case fit squarely into whatever the textbook said it was.

For instance, he was supposed to be a "Good Son" and a "Normal High School Teenager" and "Someone The Parents Can Be Proud Of."

He fell a step behind Minhyuk and raised his left hand, letting it hover by his neck, before dropping it and letting it swing loosely at his side.

Maybe he did belong here, more than he knew.


	4. Chapter 4

Hyungwon stared at the ceiling. He was lying on a thin cot, almost certainly one of identical dozens, part of a bulk order for the institution. His arms were lying flat at his sides, and he'd pushed the thin, scratchy blanket to the foot of the bed so it didn't cover him. He didn't want to feel trapped on his first night in his new prison.

His eyes were wide open, staring unflinchingly at the ceiling. Even breaths from the opposite side of the room created a rhythm for the night, the only sound to assure Hyungwon that time was indeed passing, albeit slowly. He'd ended up sharing the room with Wonho and Kihyun. He wasn't sure if it was supposed to be a permanent or temporary solution, but what difference did it make? Every boy was a stranger to him. They were all the same in that they were all unfamiliar.

It was just a bit unnerving, not that he wanted to admit it to himself, particularly because he'd always had his own room. Space, privacy, personal belongings -- but those were all gone now. Part of a world he'd been forced out of.

He wondered if his parents had kept his room the same, like the mourning parents on TV shows who haven't touched the room since the death of their child. Everything exactly the same as the child had left it; bed unmade, clothes strewn about. Dust, mounting day by day.

Hyungwon wondered if that's how his parents felt, as though their beloved son had died in some tragic and unfortunate accident, some horrifying event that had ripped him from their hands.

Only he hadn't been ripped away; they'd handed him over.

Hyungwon supposed it was for the best. He could be himself here, if he wanted. He could say as much or as little as he wanted to, and if it sounded crazy, then it was just as sane as every other utterance or conversation.

Hyungwon swallowed before lifting both of his hands up. He hesitated, the fingers curved into claws, hovering in front of his face. He couldn't see them in the dark, but he knew they were there.

After a pause measured only by three exhalations from the other side of the room, he put both hands on his neck, jolting slightly from the sudden contact of flesh on flesh.

Then he squeezed, not hard enough to fully cut off his air supply, but enough to feel the pressure on his carotids.

After several more of his roommates' exhalations, he let go, gasping suddenly as his stemmed air flow was no longer restricted.

He set his shaking hands back down by his sides and waited for the morning to come.


	5. Chapter 5

"-won, wake up, Hyungwon, hey..."

Hyungwon kept his eyes shut. He knew it was a dream because the voice had that faraway aura to it, like it was being filtered down like a ray of light from across a lake on the far shore.

"Hey, seriously, this kid isn't moving..."

He knew that if he opened his eyes, things would seem normal, only something would be off; the room would have five corners, or someone would have two right hands, or some small detail that he could never put his finger on, but it was there, he knew it, it was there, taunting him, poking at him.

"Hyungwon..."

Or was that what life was, a room with two corners, a person with two right hands, a reality a shade off? Was reality the thing that was making him uncomfortable?

He could never be certain.

He opened his eyes and immediately regretted it. The light in the room - he was pretty sure it had an automatic on and off time - was a dirty off-white. It made everything look suspicious, dangerous, off somehow.

"Oh, you're alive."

Hyungwon stared at the boy. He seemed familiar.  _But familiar from a dream, or from reality?_

"Hey, say something," the boy said, his brow creasing.

"They tried to eliminate him last night," the other boy said, worrying his lip. "I know it. Check his neck for a mark, like a needle or something...and his pulse, does it seem slow to you?"

"I'm not checking his pulse," the other boy said hesitantly before looking at Hyungwon as though reconsidering.

Had he dreamed of being sent to the institution, or was it reality?

"Fine, I'll do it," the other boy snapped, reaching out for Hyungwon's neck with a hand, and Hyungwon immediately fell back onto the bed, his head hitting the concrete wall, avoiding the boy's touch.

_Reality, then._

"What's his problem?" the boy - Kihyun - asked, looking over at the other one.

_Wonho?_

_Jay Park?_

_Shin Hoseok?_

_Who is he?_

"You tried to strangle him after he just woke up?" Wonho - whoever he was - asked, sounding unsure.

"I wasn't trying to-" Kihyun huffed. "Whatever. You're awake now. You have to change. We have from when the lights turn on until the first alarm to change, and then we have from the first alarm to the second alarm to get to breakfast."

Hyungwon opened his mouth hesitantly, and Wonho grimaced in sympathy.

"I'm sorry, it looks like we're just sharing this one room, so, uh, there's not much privacy for changing. Kihyun and I already changed, but, um, we could just look away or something if it makes you uncomfortable-"

"Stop babying him, Wonho," Kihyun snapped, his eyes narrowed. Hyungwon hadn't gotten a positive vibe from him yesterday, and it seemed as though the morning had done nothing to improve it. "He's what, sixteen, seventeen years old? And he's still scared of changing in front of strangers?"

"You changed in the corner," Wonho pointed out.

"To avoid most of the cameras," Kihyun hissed.

"Cameras?" Hyungwon interrupted. "In...in here, too?"

Wonho shrugged apologetically even though he had nothing to do with it and he was just as new as Hyungwon. "Privacy is apparently lower on the list than safety. I guess they use the footage of us changing to check for self-inflicted harm or anything."

Hyungwon frowned. Even if he'd disliked his old reality, he hadn't been monitored while undressing. It felt...intrusive. Invasive. Unwanted eyes in unwanted places.

"It's best to just get it over with quickly," Wonho said, his eyes concerned.

Hyungwon didn't respond, just grabbed his uniform and quickly stripped off his shirt, dragging his uniform shirt over his head, and he let it cover his lower region while he quickly removed his pants and underwear before pulling on clean ones.

"Wow, I thought you'd be skin and bones but you actually have a bit of muscle on you," Wonho said, sounding impressed, and Hyungwon spun around quickly, his cheeks flushed.

"You said you wouldn't look!"

"I said I wouldn't if you were uncomfortable but you didn't really say anything so-"

Hyungwon sighed harshly, still feeling heat flooding to his face even though he had no real reason to be embarrassed. He'd attended high school, for a while at least, and he'd been forced to change in the locker rooms there, too.

Although, there hadn't been cameras, and everybody else had been changing at the same time, not staring at him.

"You'll get over it," Kihyun said, and whereas Wonho sounded at least somewhat genuinely sympathetic, Kihyun lacked any sympathy. "There are always cameras, watching everything. When you piss, they want to know about it so they can write it down in their secret little files. This isn't anything. Wait for Sunday."

"What-" Hyungwon cut himself off. He knew exactly what Kihyun was doing, and he didn't want to give in, but he couldn't help himself from falling into the trap. "What happens Sunday?"

"You'll see," Kihyun said, frowning, and Hyungwon took that as a bad sign. "Now hurry up and make your bed. Dirty clothes go in the bin-" He pointed. "Our room has to be neat every morning or we get demerits, and I don't want you screwing it up for us."

Hyungwon didn't really understand why Wonho - new, old, whatever he was - seemed to be included in the us that Hyungwon wasn't apart of.

Still, Hyungwon hated drawing conflict, so he shut his mouth and threw his night clothes into the hamper before straightening the unused blanket across the mattress. But he had to clench his jaw while doing it, and his shoulder blades were sore from the tension in them, because while he didn't want to draw conflict, he hated being bossed about, and the last thing he wanted to end up being was somebody's errand boy. Just because he was new didn't mean he deserved to be treated like trash.

"Fine," Kihyun said, as though just saying Good would be too much encouragement. "Now let's-"

The first alarm went off, sort of like a high school bell, only it was a high-pitched beep followed by two identical beeps.

"-go," Kihyun said.

"Okay, I just have to tie my-" Hyungwon began, kneeling down, but he stopped.

"Your shoes don't have laces. None of ours do. They can't have us killing ourselves," Kihyun said. "Now hurry up. If we don't make it before the second bell-"

"We'll get a demerit," Hyungwon finished up for him in a sharp tone, standing up. "I know."

"So move it," Kihyun snapped, and Hyungwon sealed his lips into a line before moving toward the door.

"Isn't it locked from outside-"

"Electronically wired to unlock at the first bell," Kihyun said. "Hurry up."

Hyungwon sighed before opening the door, Wonho following him.

"He had a dream about being buried alive so he's a little tense right now," Wonho explained gently. "Sorry he's being so mean to you. He's not always like this."

Hyungwon gave him a weird look. "Why, do you know him?"

Wonho blinked. "Well, no, I just met him yesterday but-" He paused. "I don't know, just a feeling, I guess..."

"Breakfast, now, people," Kihyun called out from behind him, and Hyungwon let the matter drop, following them presumably to the classroom where the food would be delivered like yesterday, but they surprised him by taking a different turn.

"Breakfast is always served in the cafeteria," Kihyun said shortly. "All the kids from all the wings go there."

Hyungwon swallowed and let them lead on.


	6. Chapter 6

"Everyone's part of a wing," Changkyun explained. They were all sitting at a circular table with a capital M engraved in the center. "We're M-wing. We used to be F-wing, but then Jooheon-" He pauses to glare at the boy in question, who only shrugged half-heartedly and took an aggressive swallow of water. "-broke three windows in our classroom - that was all of them - so they had to transfer us into one without windows."

"The lower the letter, the less privileges you are allowed," Shownu hopped in, giving Hyungwon a small smile. "Like windows, for instance. Or having lunch in the cafeteria. Some wings don't have cameras in their dorms, and some even have solo rooms. It's all about how much they can trust us." Shownu paused thoughtfully. "They still have to do Sunday evaluations, though. Everyone does."

"Sunday?" Hyungwon croaked out, shorting a glance over at Kihyun, who had ceased communication once his job as cafeteria escort was over. Now, he was hunched over his tray, eating quickly and methodically, looking up at the cameras in the corners of the room every so often. "What- What happens on Sunday?"

Shownu looked at Changkyun, pity in his eyes, before sighing when he realized he was on his own to explain. "Don't worry about it, Hyungwon. It's- It's not that bad, really, just a little uncomfortable, so..." He trailed off and looked over beseechingly at Changkyun once more.

"So," Changkyun said, looking up at Hyungwon. "What's it like on the outside?"

Hyungwon blinked. What was he supposed to tell them? What did they want to know? He hadn't paid much attention to current events anyway since he'd had more pressing obsessions to fret over. "It's..." He paused. "How long have you been in here?" He asked instead.

Changkyun's lips tugged down at the corners, but he didn't seem particularly upset at having been asked. "Four or five months, give or take. My mom started dating a guy with a young kid, and they didn't want me scaring her." Changkyun's eyes flashed with anger. "I wasn't trying to scare her, and I wasn't telling any lies, you got that?!"

"No ones saying that you lied," Shownu said softly, putting a hand on Changkyun's back without applying any pressure, as he didn't want Changkyun to feel attacked.

"But you're all thinking it," Changkyun snapped, glaring at everyone at the table, only most of them were ignoring him anyway. His eyes ended on Hyungwon before lowering his eyes, his face flushed red, both out of anger and shame.

"No, we aren't," Shownu said before giving Hyungwon a prodding look.

"I don't think you're lying," Hyungwon said somewhat unconvincingly. He was starting to understand what Minhyuk had meant the other day, that they all had to support each other, because who else did hey have?

"He's a bloody liar and he knows it," Jooheon muttered from the other side of the table, and Changkyun's head snapped up.

"Hey!" Changkyun snapped. "Say it to my face you little bitch!"

Jooheon pushed his empty tray toward the center of the table before standing up. "You want me to say it to your face? Huh? Well you're batshit crazy and always making shit up. No wonder your mom put you in here."

"Jooheon, stop provoking him," Shownu said harshly.

Hyungwon stared down at his tray.

_Stop telling lies, Hyungwon! No one wants to hear your lies!_

_We didn't raise you to be a liar!_

_Why do you insist on saying things that aren't true? Are you trying to upset us?_

"I believe you," Hyungwon said abruptly, his words uneven.

The table grew silent.

"Maybe you're a liar too," Jooheon sneered.

Hyungwon looked down.  _Maybe I am._

"Can't we just enjoy breakfast?" Wonho asked with a strained look on his face. Neither Minhyuk nor Kihyun responded, but Jooheon exhaled sharply before sitting back down.

Wonho sank into his seat in a moment of relief before observing the rest of the table.

Changkyun, his jaw clenched, body language defensive.

Shownu, upset and sympathetic.

Kihyun, unaffected.

Minhyuk, also unaffected.

Jooheon, his momentary adrenaline slowly draining.

And Hyungwon, staring down at the table as though it held the answer to a question he was afraid to voice.

Hyungwon, who had sounded just a little bit broken when he had told Changkyun he'd believed him.

Hyungwon, who has sounded like he'd wished someone else would have said the words to him instead.


	7. Chapter 7

Breakfast passed without incident following the earlier conflict. Hyungwon had spent the rest of his meal with his head on the table, flushed cheek pressed against the smooth surface. He was tired.

An alarm went out over the room, and all the kids began getting up at once.

Nobody at the table said anything, but Hyungwon thought that he understood. They had until the next alarm to reach their classroom.

Sure enough, he followed them in and slid into the desk beside Minhyuk. Hyungwon immediately put his head back down. It felt too heavy for his neck to hold up, and if he passed out and hit his head again, he'd have a headache when he woke up.

He stared at the boy next to him through his lashes, his eyes half-lidded. Yesterday, Minhyuk had been so bright, so full of energy.

Hyungwon watched as Minhyuk's hand clenched. "Stop staring at me. It's creeping me out," Minhyuk muttered, and Hyungwon just blinked twice before closing his eyes.

The second alarm sounded, and their teacher entered a moment after, the door locking behind him as he brought the door shut. "Good morning. Hyungwon, lift your head up."

Hyungwon slowly raised his head. His vision was slightly blurred.  _If I don't get some sleep, I might collapse again soon._

"Good. Now, we will be continuing our lesson from yesterday."

***

Hyungwon had forced himself to stay awake through class, and lunch, and class again, but his body grew heavier and he was pretty sure he'd be waking up with a headache soon.

In his old school, he'd been instructed to tell the teachers when he felt this close to passing out, but he already knew the teacher here didn't like him. Most of the class was quiet today, each boy shut away in a problematic world of his own.

Hyungwon was alone.

_If I collapse in the hallway, will they help me get back to our room?_

He smiled bitterly to himself a moment later.

_Of course. They wouldn't want a demerit._

The final bell rang for class, and everyone rose, Changkyun hurrying out of the room first, followed by Shownu, then Minhyuk, then Jooheon.

Hyungwon rose gingerly before heading to the door. Then he was out the door, forcing one fact in front of the other, staring down at the tiles.

_Just keep going. You're almost to the room. Just a little farther._

Only he faltered at his next step, and his eyes rolled back into his head as he collapsed.

Wonho's eyes widened as he saw Hyungwon pause and wobble for a second before his knees gave out. He ran forward and got a hand under Hyungwon's back, holding the unconscious boy upright before slipping a hand under his knees and lifting him parallel to the ground.

"Should have left him," Kihyun snapped as he passed Wonho before reconsidering. "Scratch that. We don't want a demerit. Just throw him on his bed."

Wonho frowned. Everyone had been tense today, and it all stemmed back to the argument with Changkyun.

Everybody had accepted that maybe they belonged here, that maybe they were crazy.

But no one wanted to feel invalidated. Nobody wanted to be isolated from the others. Even if they were wrong, they still wanted to matter, to feel justified.

Everybody wanted someone to believe them. Even if what they said wasn't necessarily true.

Because it was true for them.

Wonho set Hyungwon down on his bed. He hesitated before arranging Hyungwon's limbs so they laid comfortable straight. Then he folded Hyungwon's hands across his stomach.

But then when he took a step back, he pulled in a ragged breath, quickly moving forward and placing Hyungwon's arms at his sides.

Maybe it had been the placement of his hands, or maybe just how still and limp Hyungwon was in his sleep, but he had looked...

For a moment, it had looked to Wonho as though Hyungwon were dead.


	8. Chapter 8

Hyungwon clawed frantically at the hands on his neck. His lungs burned, clawing at him from the inside, hungry, relentless. Black spots started appearing in his vision, multiplying and spreading. He raked at the hands with his fingernails, trying to draw blood, anything to loosen the pressure. He felt his knees buckling beneath him, the hands still holding him up, hungry, relentless; his vision, total black, but he still felt the hands, still dug at them with his fingernails until-

"Ow! Son of a bitch!"

Hyungwon stirred, opening his eyes, but he was met with darkness.

"Finally, you woke up," Wonho said after removing a finger from his mouth. It was bleeding. "Sorry, I didn't mean to swear at you, it was just a reflex."

"I-" Hyungwon paused.  _Did I die? Or faint? Is this the dream, or...?_

"You were twitching a lot in your sleep," Wonho explained, and even though it was hard to see Wonho in the dark, Hyungwon knew it was him by his voice. "And then, um, you started scratching at your neck, but when I tried to stop you, you started scratching at me instead, so..." He paused, fumbling with the words. "Well, then you woke up."

"Did-" Hyungwon hesitated. He was pretty sure the suffocating part had been the dream, and this was reality. "Did I hurt you?"

"Me? No," Wonho said with a faltering laugh as his right hand throbbed from where Hyungwon's fingernails had cut into the skin. "Just a flesh wound. No harm done."

They fell into silence. Kihyun was asleep.

"You probably think I'm crazy now," Hyungwon said slowly, and Wonho licked his bottom lip.

"No I don't," Wonho said, but he couldn't forget the moment in the middle of the night when he'd been woken up by the scratching sound of Hyungwon's hands clawing at his own neck.

"You do," Hyungwon said. It wasn't an accusatory statement. Hyungwon just sounded...tired. Like he'd heard it once, heard it again, and had gotten tired of insisting otherwise.

"We're all a little crazy here," Wonho said with a smile in the dark that didn't reach the recipient, trying to make everything all right, but he knew he'd made a mistake when he heard the shuffling of sheets as Hyungwon turned his back to Wonho, facing the wall.

Wonho bit his lip. He hadn't meant to upset Hyungwon, but...the guy had been trying to hurt himself - and shortly after, Wonho - in his sleep. Hyungwon seemed to be a nice enough kid, sure, but it was becoming rather apparent to Wonho that Hyungwon really did belong here, and not just for narcolepsy.

Wonho remembered thinking that crazy or not, they all just wanted someone to believe in them, to convince them that they were at least a little sane.

But maybe...

Maybe Wonho didn't have to be that person for Hyungwon.


	9. Chapter 9

Hyungwon was silent at breakfast that day. All of them were quiet, though, so nobody suspected anything much to be wrong.

Nobody, except Wonho. But no matter how much Wonho tried to meet his eyes, Hyungwon refused to look at him.

Hyungwon picked at his food while looking around the room. Tables like theirs, each with a wing letter on them. Most of the tables seated five or six kids. Some, like their own, held seven.

But no matter how many times Hyungwon counted, he only came up with 25.  _Maybe I missed one?_

"Family day is coming up," Shownu said, trying to start a conversation. When he saw Hyungwon look over at him, he smiled. "Once a month," family or other authorized guests are allowed to visit. You get to see them for an hour. It's nice."

Hyungwon gave no reaction. He wasn't sure if his parents would come, and if they did, he wasn't sure how they would act. Happy that he was finally "getting help"? Disappointed in him for needing help in the first place?

Or would they treat him like Wonho had treated him, like he was misillusioned, a child, like he was stupid and-

 _Crazy_.

But the more Hyungwon tried to fight it, the less he found he wanted to. What was so bad about being crazy, anyway?

_Maybe they can help me here. Maybe...maybe they can make the dreams go away..._

Sometimes, he preferred thinking he was crazy, because the alternative meant that the dreams were real.

"Is your family coming?" Shownu asked Hyungwon, still trying to be polite for a reason Hyungwon didn't understand.

Hyungwon ignored him, not wanting to think of his family, not wanting to see their faces in his mind.

"I hope not," Jooheon answered, slamming his spoon down on his tray. "I wish my dad would just drop dead already. Old bastard would be doing the world a favor."

"My mom'll probably come," Minhyuk said from the other side of the table, stirring his food with no intent on eating it. "If she's not all cracked up. She was last month. But maybe...maybe not this month, you know..."

"I guess it depends if my mom's boyfriend is in town," Changkyun said after a beat. Nobody wanted to be the one to break it to Minhyuk that it hadn't just been last month that she'd missed but also the three months before last. "She won't come if he's here. But..." He trailed off. "What about you, Shownu?"

Shownu smiled. "My parents come every month to visit us," he said. "To visit me," he corrected. "But my dad usually waits outside the room. He doesn't like seeing me much."

Kihyun laughed. "Your dad doesn't like seeing you?" He slammed his tray down on the table and growled, "My mom tried to bloody kill me! Crazy bitch."

Hyungwon wondered if that was how Kihyun's severe paranoia had been created, having his trust broken by someone who was supposed to love him unconditionally.

Hyungwon wondered if he'd end up the same way.

Wonho, meanwhile, was wondering if anyone would come to visit him.

***

School progressed quickly that day because it all went right over Hyungwon's head. His thoughts were torn between Sunday evaluations and and family visits. He didn't know what to expect from either.

But he didn't want to dwell over his own issues. He'd learned from breakfast that everyone else had it harder than he did. He just needed to suck it up and stop acting like it was the end of the world.

Easier said than done.

He noticed Wonho following him closely back to their room.

 _Probably waiting for me to pass out so he can be my knight in shining armor again_ , Hyungwon thought bitterly. He ignored Wonho's presence and continued on ahead until he'd reached their room. Then he sat down on his bed and focused on avoiding eye contact with his roommates.

Kihyun entered and sprawled down on his bed, glaring at the cameras. "Can't we get any damn privacy in this place?" He paused and dropped his voice. "I heard some of the higher-up rooms don't have cameras. They don't have to deal with having someone watch them every second." He scowled at the camera before transferring the scowl to Hyungwon. "What's your deal anyway?"

"I'm sorry?" Hyungwon replied, confused.

"What's wrong with you?"

Hyungwon thought for a moment about what he should say. "I..." But he frowned after a moment. Everyone here already hated him. Or so it felt like. Telling them would do nothing, change nothing. Worse than nothing, they could harass him or make fun of him or treat him like Changkyun, like a liar.

If Hyungwon would be disliked either way, he'd rather keep his secrets to himself. "It's none of your business," he snapped, and Wonho frowned, having never heard Hyungwon use such a sharp tone before. He wondered if he was to blame for it.

"Fine, freak," Kihyun snapped back, and Hyungwon found that it didn't hurt as much as other things that had been said to (or about) him

Because he was just one freak out of many here.


	10. Chapter 10

Sunday came, and with it came the weekly evaluation.

"Chae Hyungwon for his physical examination," a nurse announced in the waiting room outside the doctor's quarters. Shownu had already gone, giving Hyungwon an encouraging smile. Minhyuk had also already gone. He looked a bit tired, but there was a bit of life in his face today that hadn't been there for the past several days.

Hyungwon got up slowly and went through the door the nurse was holding open for him.

"Remove all clothing and place it in the bin," the nurse instructed, and Hyungwon felt his breath catch.

"What-"

"All clothing in the bin. The doctor will be in shortly." She pulled a curtain in front of the door, and Hyungwon heard it shut behind her.

He took a moment to look around. White tiled flooring like the rest of the institution paired with white brick walls. A few faded posters on the wall gave him tips on how to beat bronchitis, identify a hematoma, and prevent artery clogging. Hyungwon's heartbeat was skipping, and he was tempted to read every small print word if it meant delaying the inevitable.

After a moment, however, he forced himself to begin unbuttoning his shirt. The collar was firm, and his fingers struggled for a moment, scrabbling against the smooth surface of the button before gaining traction and releasing it. His fingers trembled as he worked his way down one button at a time, and then his shirt fell open, threatening to spill of his narrow shoulders, and he let it slip, let it fall to the ground.

He stopped for a moment before sliding his pants off, the cool of the room starting to seep into and under his skin. His pants fell to the ground, followed by his underwear, pooling around his thin ankles. He stepped out of them, right foot followed by left. He stood there in his socks for a minute, his socks the only cloth he had on left, the socks the only layer suspending the bare soles of his feet from making contact with the cold floor. Then he stripped those off too. He picked up the discarded clothes in his hands and set them in the bin.

And then he waited, stark naked and utterly vulnerable.

The door opened several minutes later, giving Hyungwon plenty of time to wonder if this room had cameras too, and for what purpose. But then the doctor entered, and his thoughts were blown away like the seeds of a dandelion.

"Chae Hyungwon?"

"Yes," Hyungwon said from the other side, naked, cold.

"Are you fully undressed?"

"Yes," Hyungwon said again. He thought for a fleeting second that maybe it was good that the doctor was asking. Maybe it meant he didn't already know because there weren't cameras in the room. Hyungwon was sick of cameras. They paid more attention to him than anyone else.

The door shut, and the curtain was pushed aside, revealing Hyungwon, hands clasped in front of him in an effort to cover himself. The doctor walked further into the room, a clipboard in his hand, not even looking up. "How are we doing today, Hyungwon?"

Hyungwon shuddered slightly. He hated that phrase, mainly the use of the word  ** _we_** , because  ** _we_**  weren't uncomfortable and  ** _we_**  weren't cold and  ** _we_**  weren't naked, only Hyungwon was. "Fine," he answered shortly, hoping it would speed things along faster.

"Good to hear," the doctor said, still looking down at his clipboard. He was a shorter man, at least a head shorter than Hyungwon, and his belly protruded slightly from his abdomen. He wasn't necessarily portly or overweight, though, merely a bit rounded at the edges. His eyes were small and beady, set slightly back into his face. His hairline was being pushed further and further back like an ocean tide being drawn at the call of the moon, and it was losing every battle to hold its ground on the front concerning his pate. No wedding band on his finger, and given his age, he probably would never wear one. "Since this is your first evaluation, I want to take a minute and explain how this works. Does that sound all right to you, Hyungwon?"

Hyungwon nodded because there wasn't any room for a different answer.

"Good." The doctor shifted. He was wearing a name tag, but it was angled away from Hyungwon so he couldn't make out the whole of the man's name. "Each evaluation has two parts, the physical examination, followed by the psyche examination. The examinations aren't meant to make you feel uncomfortable, but I understand that it can feel like a breach of your privacy. That said, we conduct them weekly to make sure that you're staying health physically while we work on improving and stabilizing your mental state." He gave Hyungwon a smile as though he were confiding a secret. "Don't let anybody tell you that you can get by with one or the other. Often times, they affect each other. Physical exercise has been shown to lead to declined levels of depression, and depression can cause feelings of not wanting to do anything because nothing brings pleasure. In order to help you, Hyungwon, we need to make sure that you're doing well in both fields to give you the best chance at healing and overcoming psychological obstacles. Do you understand?"

Hyungwon nodded. He knew that the doctor probably gave the same speech to everyone, but he couldn't help but feel slightly relieved.

"The first portion is the physical exam. It's like a normal doctor's appointment - we're just making sure you're healthy and in good condition. Then we'll proceed to the psyche exam. We'll be asking you questions to gauge your mental health." The doctor smiled at Hyungwon, a few teeth slightly crooked. "If circumstances change and we or your guardians would like to withdraw you from the program, you have to pass two consecutive evaluations in both the physical and psyche portions. Does that all make sense?"

Hyungwon nodded.

"All right, then let's get started, shall we?"


	11. Chapter 11

"Please unclasp your hands and hold them out to your sides, parallel with the ground."

Hyungwon felt his heart drop before he moved his arms, forcing them out to the sides, forcing himself to be fully vulnerable in front of a man he'd never met.

The doctor nodded and brought his clipboard with him as he walked around Hyungwon, studying him like a piece of foreign art, looking with great curiosity but not touching. He pushed down on his arm slightly before removing his hand, letting Hyungwon's arm lift back up to its original position, before continuing to circle Hyungwon. "Any abnormal pain? Recent injuries?"

"No," Hyungwon said, staring at the floor. He didn't want to look at the man who was looking at him.

A pause. The doctor stopped circling but instead drew closer. "Hyungwon, I understand that you may be in slight discomfort, but it is absolutely paramount that we maintain honest communication during these evaluations," the doctor said softly before hovering several fingers over Hyungwon's neck.

Hyungwon flinched and took a step back. He didn't want anybody touching his neck. Even as fully exposed as he was, he still felt the most vulnerable there, and it was reflex that had propelled him away from the doctor's gentle touch.

"Please, Hyungwon, relax," the doctor said, frowning. "I'm disappointed in you. You said you had no recent injuries, but there are marks on your neck. They look like scratches, Hyungwon. How did you get them?"

Hyungwon forced himself to stand still. "I had a dream. It was...very real."

"Were you scared, Hyungwon?" the doctor asked, looking thoughtful.

Hyungwon paused, nodded.

"Were you fighting against someone else or against yourself?"

"Someone else."

"Do you know who you were fighting, Hyungwon?"

"No. I...didn't see a face," Hyungwon said. He didn't want to think about it. Thinking about it made it real, and making it real made him crazy.

The doctor seemed to sense Hyungwon pulling back, so he just nodded and made a note to bring it up later. "We'll open that back up in a bit. I have a few more questions for the physical exam. And, please, Hyungwon, it's absolutely imperative that you answer me truthfully, all right?"

Hyungwon nodded, swallowing.

"Have you been sexually active while a member of this institution?"

Hyungwon's eyes widened. "No," he said, face flushed. "I've never- I'm not sexually active."

The doctor stared at him before nodding and writing something down. He asked Hyungwon a number of questions, most of them questions which made him uncomfortable. Some were about his diet, some about his sleep, some even about urination and digestion.

After fifteen minutes of prying reluctant answers out of Hyungwon, the doctor announced that they were done with the physical portion of the exam "for today" and would move on to the psyche portion.

"So, Hyungwon," the doctor began. It was only at this point that Hyungwon was able to make out the tag pinned to his jacket which read Dr. Irving. Dr. Irving's eyes jumped left to right as he skimmed Hyungwon's medical record. "How have you been doing with your narcolepsy?"

"It's fine," Hyungwon said, twitching. He wanted to leave. "I'm fine."

Dr. Irving stared at him before sighing and massaging the bridge of his nose. "Hyungwon, from what footage we have and accounts from your teacher, your symptoms have been overactive. Have you had trouble sleeping? I know that it can be difficult to adjust your sleeping pattern when in a new environment." He paused, looking up from the chart. "But is that all it is, Hyungwon? Or...is this about the dreams you've been having?"

Hyungwon jerked to the right, an involuntary reflex. "I- I didn't say anything about dreams."

Dr. Irving's voice was gentle, patient. "People with narcolepsy often have extremely vivid dreams, dreams so real they can be mistaken for reality. And you're more likely to entertain lucid dreams - that means you can control your actions and choices while dreaming - which makes it seem even more real." He paused before smiling, but Hyungwon knew it was a smile that meant he felt bad for Hyungwon, and Hyungwon didn't like it. "On your file, it has a note about your recent dreams. It looks like your guardian supplied information about your dreams, or at least, what you told her of them."

 _Of course Mom told them,_  Hyungwon thought, feeling angry and hurt and betrayed and fairly certain that his feelings were not at all justified. He stayed silent, and Dr. Irving sighed.

"Hyungwon, please understand that it's difficult to help you if you don't want to be helped. Can you discuss your dreams with me so I can try to help you understand them and cope with them?"

Hyungwon looked off to the side. He was cold, he was naked, his neck was pulsing, and he didn't want to talk about the dreams. "Can I put my clothes on now?"

Dr. Irving sighed, realizing that he wouldn't get through to Hyungwon after that point. "You may get dressed. We'll resume our conversation next week, all right, Hyungwon?"

Hyungwon was holding his shirt in his hands, holding it in front of himself.

Dr. Irving sighed, deeper this time. "I hope you're more sincere about helping yourself get better next week, Hyungwon."

Hyungwon stared at him with haunted eyes.

Dr. Irving sighed for the last time before leaving the room, drawing the curtain once more before opening the door and closing it behind himself.

Hyungwon exhaled heavily, dressing himself quickly. He didn't stop to check if the buttons were all properly aligned or if his right sock was on his right or left foot (did they even have designated feet?). He threw on his clothing, putting on his socks then his shoes last, and left the room.

That was how Hyungwon survived his first evaluation, and his first week at the mental institution came to a close.


	12. Chapter 12

"Hi, I'm Nathan," Wonho said, bowing slightly before the class before biting his lip and looking over at his teacher. He wasn't sure why he was in a classroom, especially not when he was a professional fitness trainer and was supposed to be working the eight to four shift in the weight room (strength training on Mondays, endurance on Wednesdays, and some aerobics and cardio on Thursdays). But his job sent him to different classes all the time to become more knowledgeable about different exercise techniques and muscle groups, so he figured it was one of their new programs that they'd signed him up for.

Only he hadn't been prepared for such a small class of young kids that didn't look like they'd ever picked up a weight in their lives. Well, some of them looked fit enough, but one kid especially was so thin that Wonho worried about his stamina. It looked like a gust of wind could blow him over, to borrow the cliche, only there were no windows in the classroom. Odd.

"Please have a seat beside Changkyun," the instructor said, and Wonho nodded, scanning the room and going over to the empty seat next to the boy with his hand raised.

"Nice to meet you, I'm Nathan," Wonho introduced himself with a confident smile. "What gym are you from?"

Changkyun blinked. "Gym?" He shivered slightly. "I hate gyms."

Wonho blinked, astounded. "Wha- why?"

"Because, everybody's sweating, you know? Only inside the sweat are these little things called Zumeels, they're so small you'd need a microscope to see them, and they travel through one person's sweat onto the machines and then onto the next person through  _their_  sweat and they work their way into your bloodstream and once they're inside-"

"Changkyun, please be quiet," the teacher said.

Changkyun fell silent as Wonho shifted uneasily in his seat. He made eye contact with the skeletal boy across the room.

The boy turned his head the other way.

Wonho frowned.

"Maybe you can introduce me to everyone at lunch?" Wonho whispered to the boy beside him. He may have been strange, sure, but Wonho could use a bit of camaraderie since it appeared that he had been the last one to join the class.

Changkyun opened his mouth before nodding. "Sorry, I forget that you- sure, sure."

Wonho blinked before looking back at the instructor, squinting at the board. He wasn't sure why his supervisor had sent him to attend a program on mathematics, but he was paid for all of his training, so he had nothing better to do than sit in a desk and make money.

***

Hyungwon turned his head away from Wonh- from Nathan. He sensed the inquisitive but confident nature of the boy across the room, but he didn't want to get involved with him again. Not with Jay, not with Nathan, not with Wonho or Shin Hoseok or whoever he really was.

But now that Hyungwon's mind was on him, he couldn't remember him ever returning to their room last night. He'd been too distracted by the somewhat traumatizing and invasive evaluation to notice it, but he'd only heard one other set of breathing last night. Kihyun's.

 _Odd_ , Hyungwon thought, but he didn't dare to cast another glance at the boy who called himself Nathan.

He'd seen how Jay had looked at him, and even if Nathan was a different person, even if Nathan wasn't about to cast the same stones that Jay had, Jay and Nathan shared the same eyes, the same voice, and Hyungwon couldn't get it out of his head.

He'd known the moment, the exact moment, when Wonho had stopped believing him to be normal. But there hadn't been anything to fight, and no one to fight it anyway. Hyungwon didn't see the point. He was a troubled boy in a mental institution plagued by violent dreams that had prompted him to hurt himself. You couldn't add it all up and  _not_  come up with crazy.

But as much as Hyungwon fought it, he'd missed Wonho's quiet kindness when most of their class seemed so sharp and bitter.

"Want to copy my notes later?" came a whisper from his right, and Hyungwon looked over at Minhyuk in surprise. Minhyuk was grinning like they were wearing friendship bracelets that were invisible to Hyungwon's eyes.

 _Funny, I thought he hated me. He's given me the impression over the past few days of just that. So why is he all bubbly again?_  "Does any of it really matter anyway?" Hyungwon asked back softly. The teacher yelled at him enough. He didn't want to get in more trouble.

Minhyuk snorted, throwing Hyungwon a half-shrug. "I like feeling smart. It makes me feel less crazy. Like I'm in control of something. Does that make sense?"

Hyungwon thought about it for a moment before nodding. It did, in a way. "Okay. Thanks, Minhyuk."

Minhyuk grinned and gave him a thumbs-up. "No problem, deskmate of mine."

From across the room, Wonho watched them conspiring together and frowned.

***

"I'm Chankgyun, this is Shownu, that's Kihyun, that's Minhyuk, that's Hyungwon, and he's Jooheon," Changkyun announced in one fell swoop as soon as they'd all pushed their desks together. "And this is Jay, everyone."

Wonho frowned but quickly forced his lips into a smile, a polite one that firmly insisted  _I'm afraid you're mistaken._  "My name is actually Nathan, not Jay."

"Shit, sorry," Changkyun mumbled.

Wonho tried to hold his smile up. He didn't really understand what was going on, but he was being paid, so...He made eye contact with a boy to the left, the only one who seemed to be paying attention to him.

"I'm Shownu," the boy said. "Nathan, right?"

Wonho nodded, feeling somewhat relieved to have found someone with better social awareness. "Yeah, I'm Nathan. I'm a trainer over at 24/7 Fitness, although I only work there Monday/Wednesday/Thursday, so..." He let out a light chuckle, and Shownu smiled politely.

"That's nice," Shownu said, and Wonho got the feeling that he wasn't a trainer, that none of them were, because when you brought up your gym in front of other trainers, they all started clamoring about who had the newest and best equipment and what they could all bench and what their mile time was and all that.

"Yeah," Wonho said hollowly. Everything felt off. And the one guy on the opposite side of the room was intentionally avoiding eye contact, this time by scribbling down something in his notebook while the guy next to him laughed and verbally abused the taller boy's handwriting.

"Welcome to M-wing," one of the guys to his right said. J-something. "Enjoy your stay," he said with a snicker before taking a sip of water.

"It'll be annoying later if you're asking a bunch of questions, so I'll just let you know that you're rooming with me and Hyungwon," the shortest one on the left said.

"Oh," Wonho said. He hadn't been prepared for an overnight program. "Well, I don't think I have any extra clothing packed or anything-"

"There's a spare uniform on your bed in our room and extra underwear and socks and everything for the week," Kihyun said, chewing in quick bites.

 _A whole week here? For what?_  "All right," Wonho said with less certainly, feeling his confidence waver.

It looked like it was going to be a long seven days.


	13. Chapter 13

Minhyuk, Hyungwon found out, had been given a new, recently-approved drug that had already been tested and had just hit the market. Dr. Irving had told Minhyuk about it during his evaluation before asking Minhyuk if he'd like to try the new medication, and Minhyuk had agreed, telling Dr. Irving that he'd felt the previous one losing its effectiveness.

"Bipolar," Minhyuk explained to Hyungwon on the walk back to their rooms after class had finished. "You like to put a name with things, right? I'm bipolar. It's like you're spinning out of control in two opposite directions, and you can't stop it or slow it down, just hold tight and hang on for the ride." Minhyuk slowed his steps, and Hyungwon slowed down with them. Almost everyone else had already gone ahead. "I just wanted to tell you since you're the only one who didn't know. Well, Wonho, I'm sure he knew at some point, maybe not now, but earlier." He paused, looking left, then up, then right, then down. "I'm just-"

"You don't have to tell me," Hyungwon said quickly, even though his heart burned slightly. It ached for friendship in a place that hadn't rewarded him with any. He'd found it just as difficult to get close with someone as it was to keep them away, and while his thoughts contradicted each other, he couldn't decide which side to choose. He didn't have to strength to completely isolate himself, but getting closer to the others only meant he'd get hurt in the long run.

Minhyuk's laugh, a sound that had been missing for several days, echoed off the walls, and Hyungwon realized that it had been days since  _anyone_  had laughed. "No, I'm just trying to apologize for being so bitchy to you lately. The hormones took the wheel for a bit there, and they don't exactly play nicely with others." He grinned at Hyungwon. "I know this place can be sort of miserable, and I know we're awful company, but I hope you can find whatever it is you're looking for here." Minhyuk paused, looking down at his feet, which had come to a full halt. "For me..." he began, and his words took on the heavy tone of guilt. "It's kind of nice to just worry about myself. When I was living with my mom..." He licked his lips. "It was like trying to take care of my own kid. And it sounds selfish and horrible but it makes it easier, not having to take care of her and cook for her and break her cigarettes and hide our savings so she didn't spend it on crack."

Hyungwon swallowed, unsure what to do with all the information Minhyuk had just thrown at him, deep, personal information. Was he supposed to share his dark secrets, too?

But then Minhyuk looked up at Hyungwon and grinned. "Shit, that got dark. I just wanted to say, may as well have some fun while you're here, right? It's not all as bad as it seems."

Hyungwon opened his mouth.

_Tell him._

_Tell him about the dreams, about what you saw, about what you felt._

_Tell him how your parents were humiliated by their lunatic son._

"Thanks," Hyungwon said instead, his smile somewhat crooked. He wanted to confide in someone, but so far, the only person who had experienced one of his episodes was Wonho - Jay, at the time - and Hyungwon wasn't ready for the rejection again.

"No problem," Minhyuk said as they started walking again. "They may have all these stupid rules here, but they haven't made one against having friends yet." Minhyuk laughed at his own words and stopped outside his room before looking over at Hyungwon with a softer smile on his face. "I know it's rough, Hyungwon, but you've already made it through your first week. That's the hardest one. It only gets easier from there, all right? And whatever shit you've got going on outside of this place, it's all gone right now. We're all here to get help. There's no shame in needing a little help every now and then."

Hyungwon looked down, not wanting Minhyuk to see his eyes growing slightly wet at Minhyuk's words. "You sound like Dr. Irving," he said in a rough voice, and Minhyuk snorted, mock-punching Hyungwon's shoulder.

"The difference between me and Irving is that I don't go around forcing people to get naked," Minhyuk said before his grin slid into a smirk. "People just throw their clothes off without my asking."

Hyungwon's face burned, not used to crude jokes, and Minhyuk's laughter followed him out of the hallway and into his shared room with Kihyun and Wonho.

After he'd given himself a minute to let his face return to normal, he decided that it wasn't a bad sound, not a bad sound at all.


	14. Chapter 14

"Cameras? In here?" Wonho asked, frowning at the ceiling. "For real? Why?"

"So they can watch us," Kihyun said, twitching slightly. "Always watching."

"That's...like an invasion of privacy or something," Wonho said, frowning as he set himself down on the edge of his bed. "They can't do that to us. It's gotta be illegal or something-"

"Not when you parents or guardians signed a consent form," Kihyun muttered. "Or if you self-admitted and signed it. Either way, you sign off to the cameras along with everything else."

"But, I didn't, I didn't sign anything," Wonho said. "Nobody asked me to sign anything. I just woke up and was brought into the room this morning. Why-" He stopped talking to Kihyun and looked over at Hyungwon, who had remained silent throughout their entire exchange, laying on his back, arms folded behind his head, one leg straight and the other bent at the knee. "Hey. You."

Hyungwon looked over at him with unreadable eyes.

"Do you know what's going on here?"

"...Yeah."

"And? It doesn't- it doesn't bother you at all? The cameras? All of that?"

Hyungwon shrugged. "My opinion doesn't really matter, does it?"

Wonho frowned. "Why would you think that your opinion doesn't matter? Of course it does. This is serious."

Hyungwon looked over to the left wall, avoiding eye contact with Wonho. "You stopped caring about what I think a while ago."

Wonho's frown deepened at the edges. "I'm sorry, do you have me confused with someone else? I've never met you before."

"Yeah, that must be it," Hyungwon said darkly.

"Can someone just explain to me-"

"We're all patients in a mental institution," Hyungwon snapped, and Wonho startled at the harshness in his tone. After a moment, his voice softened and sounded gentler. "Me, Kihyun, Minhyuk, Shownu, Jooheon."

"And...what about me?" Wonho asked, trepidation in his voice.

Hyungwon looked over at Wonho. "...what do you want me to tell you?"

"The truth," Wonho said. "I deserve the truth, dammit."

"Then, yeah, you too."

Wonho's mouth opened and closed as he fought to say something. "Why? I'm- I'm fine, I'm normal, there's nothing wrong with me." He cut himself off a moment later, looking at Hyungwon with wide eyes as though only seeing him for the first time. "Why are  _you_  here?"

***

"Because I killed my family, right down to the dog," Hyungwon answered dryly, and Kihyun laughed, a high-pitched, nerve-wracking sound.

"Too bad they didn't get that on their damn camera," Kihyun said, and Hyungwon hesitated before laughing along with Kihyun. He'd never connected with Kihyun before because he'd always been an outsider, but now that Wonho was new (again) and seemed even more averse to their situation while Hyungwon had had time to warm up to it...

Hyungwon was in.

He was officially part of the crazy club.

"Is that a sick joke, or..." Wonho looked back and forth between them from the other side of the room, biting his lip.

Hyungwon read the fear in his eyes, fear of him, fear of  _Hyungwon_ , and something twisted inside of him, something that hurt, something that couldn't just be put back or replaced. Since when had he begun scaring people?

But he couldn't just forget the way Wonho was looking at him.

Like he was a monster.

Hyungwon didn't want to be a monster.

With eyes prickling, he turned over in his bed, drawing the blanket over his thin body to provide an additional layer of separation between him and Wonho. "Either way, you're stuck spending the night with me," he muttered, Wonho's scared eyes trapped in his vision even after he'd closed his own.

He felt like a monster.


	15. Chapter 15

Fear. Real fear, the fear of death fast approaching. He felt the hands at his neck, squeezing, before lightening, almost taunting him, but then putting on the pressure, not letting up.

Hyungwon was terrified.

He scratched and clawed. He felt his feet leaving the ground, and they dangled loosely, fighting to get traction, but he already felt his head growing light, his vision fading, his last breaths being dragged into his empty lungs, and then-

Hyungwon gasped, pain mixing with panic mixing with relief, and he didn't know which was was up and which was was down or whether he was alive or dead or awake or dreaming or if he even existed at this point.

"Holy shit, holy shit, he's- oh, he's awake. Kihyun, what are we supposed to do? Kihyun?"

"Shut up and get out of the way. Don't touch him," Kihyun snapped, pushing Wonho aside in the dark. "He doesn't like being touched, okay? Don't crowd him or he'll feel overwhelmed." There was a moment of silence filled only by Hyungwon's panicked breaths, in and out, sounding rough and shallow. Then Kihyun spoke, his voice softer than Hyungwon had ever heard, not that Hyungwon was processing much of anything. "Hey. Hyungwon. Slow down, kid. Take deep breaths. In, out. In- Dammit, Hyungwon, you're not taking deep breaths. Shut up and listen to me," Kihyun said even though Hyungwon hadn't said a word.

Hyungwon dragged in a breath and held it, counted to three, or almost to three until he felt his lungs straining, and he exhaled.

"Slower. Breathe slower."

Hyungwon slowly evened out his breaths, and the more even they became, the softer his heartbeat was in his ears, until he was finally able to process his surroundings.

Dark.

A mattress beneath him.

A wall to his left.

The room.

They were in their dorm room.

Reality.

It had been a dream.

As always.

And he had been about to die.

As always.

He put his fists up to rub his eyes, and that's when he noticed that his face was wet. His eyes were streaming tears, and all the work he'd spent trying to calm his breathing evaporated as pathetic hiccuping sounds came out of his throat, his chest heaving up and down.

"I c-can't-" he began, covering his eyes with his hands. He didn't want anyone to see him cry, even in the dark. "I can't t-take it anymore, it's too much, I'm s-sick of this-"

"Sick of what?" Kihyun asked calmly. It was as though he'd been replaced with a completely different person. Where was the Kihyun that despised him?

"Minhyuk," Hyungwon said suddenly. "I want to t-talk with Minhyuk."  _Minhyuk will understand. He'll make everything all right. He'll fix it. He'll fix me, right?_

_I want to be fixed._

"Sorry Wonnie but we're locked in for the night," Kihyun said. Hyungwon couldn't see it in the dark, but there was genuine sadness in his eyes.

"We're locked in?" Wonho said, shocked. "That's-"

"Stop saying shit about how it's not fair," Kihyun snapped. "This isn't about you. Tired? Upset? Then go back to sleep. You can resume complaining in the morning."

Wonho faltered, sputtering slightly, at a loss for words. "I'm not- this whole place is crazy! This kid almost died, there's cameras everywhere, we're locked in-"

" _We're_  the crazy ones. Take us or leave us," Kihyun snapped.

There was a moment of silence before Wonho's footsteps could be heard as he padded over to his own bed, and his blanket rustled as he pulled it over himself.

***

Kihyun turned back to Hyungwon. He couldn't see him, but he could hear his panicked breathing. Kihyun eased himself onto Hyungwon's bed, sitting beside him, and the mattress dipped, accepting his weight. "I'm sorry, you can't see Minhyuk until the morning," Kihyun repeated softly. He could hear Hyungwon's soft cries. He wasn't sure exactly what was wrong with the boy, but it didn't matter to him. They were all broken. None of them wanted to cry alone in the dark.

"Is it all right if I'm here? Instead of Minhyuk?" Kihyun asked carefully. He'd seen how Hyungwon had reacted whenever they'd gone to touch him, and he didn't want to make Hyungwon worse than he already seemed to be.

"O-Okay," Hyungwon's voice came out, weak against the darkness.

"Is it all right if I touch you?" Kihyun asked. It was important for him to ask, to make Hyungwon feel like he had control over something when in reality he was absolutely helpless against whatever exactly it was that plagued him.

"Okay."

Kihyun reached out, fingers gentle, and when he felt the fabric of Hyungwon's shirt, he slid his hand up to Hyungwon's shoulder. Bringing his left hand up, he massaged Hyungwon's shoulders, not applying too much pressure, before he slowly drew Hyungwon closer in a hug, only he didn't let go, just held Hyungwon steady in his arms.

After a moment, Hyungwon started rocking back and forth, still crying softly and mumbling phrases that Kihyun knew Hyungwon and only Hyungwon would understand.

"I can't die again, I can't- I can't do it anymore," he choked out.

Kihyun didn't say that it would be okay because he didn't know if it would be okay. He didn't know why it wasn't okay in the first place. But his job was just to make sure that Hyungwon would make it through this minute, and then the next minute, and then the next one. He'd sensed from day one how fragile the taller boy was, and maybe that was why he'd been so mean to him. It was the reason behind kids pulling the wings off butterflies. With all fragile things comes the temptation to break them.

But Kihyun didn't want to break Hyungwon. Not anymore. Not even before, really. But he'd wanted to know exactly who Chae Hyungwon was, and as of that night, cradling Hyungwon in the dark, he knew.

He had finally met Chae Hyungwon.

And what's more, he liked him.


	16. Chapter 16

The next morning was the same as all the previous mornings, except Kihyun was still in Hyungwon's bed and Wonho woke up confused and upset and Hyungwon's eyes were puffy and his lips swollen from biting on them last night.

Kihyun was the first up, having been conditioned to wake up just before the lights turned on. He took a moment to study Hyungwon, who had always looked worn-out and tired, only it was worse on this particular morning.

"Hey," Kihyun said softly. He wasn't sure why he was being so gentle with the kid. Maybe because he felt guilty about treating him like shit on his first week, a week that was already stressful enough without him being an asshole. But he'd been rude to all the other M-wing recruits when they'd joined, except Shownu since he'd been there before Kihyun. Of course, back then, they'd been F-wing. Jooheon had joined a few weeks later and had quickly demoted them to their current rank.

"Hey. Wonnie. Woooooooooooonnie," he said. He didn't want to resort to shaking the boy because, well, while he'd allowed Kihyun to comfort him last night, that didn't mean the permission had rolled over to the morning. He didn't want to overstep any boundaries. Boundaries were important in this place because they were the only things the kids could set themselves. To overstep someone's boundaries was crossing a line, and Kihyun didn't want to cross a line.

Hyungwon's eyes fluttered open, his long lashes casting shadows on his cheeks as the lights flickered on overheard. He blinked several times, struggling to orient himself, and Kihyun realized that Hyungwon was likely trying to distinguish dream from reality.

"This is real. I'm real," Kihyun said, watching as the boy's eyes widened slightly before he frowned. Then he seemed to realize that Kihyun was in his bed, where he shouldn't be, and Kihyun stood up, minding the boundaries he sensed.

"Last night-"

"Last night was real too," Kihyun said. He heard Wonho stirring from the opposite side of the room, but he ignored him. He usually gave Wonho some leeway since it must suck to be someone else every week, but his patience had worn thin last night, and he hadn't had the control necessary to handle him. He was still pissed, even though he knew that Wonho didn't deserve it, but he was trying to ignore his anger so he didn't take it out on Hyungwon. "You can see Minhyuk at breakfast if you still want to talk to him."

Hyungwon opened his mouth before biting his lip. He wiped his eyes on his shirt sleeves even though his eyes were dry. "Thank you," he said, his voice soft, and Kihyun much preferred it to the harsh tone Hyungwon sometimes adopted when he was trying to mask his own hurt by inflicting pain on someone else. "But why-"

"We need to get changed," Kihyun said, turning his back to Hyungwon as he grabbed his uniform. "The alarm will sound soon."

Hyungwon swallowed before nodding and getting up, grabbing his uniform. That was something else Kihyun was learning to appreciate about the boy; he could be hurt and uncertain one minute, but he knew how to snap himself back into place when he needed to.

"Morning," Wonho said, a tentative greeting from the other side of the room.

Hyungwon looked over at him with hooded eyes before unbuttoning his shirt, and Kihyun didn't acknowledge him at all.

"I'm sorry," Wonho tried again, standing up and moving toward Hyungwon. "About yesterday. I- I've just been confused and out of sorts since yesterday. But...you were having a hard time breathing last night...are...are you okay?" he asked.

Hyungwon had reached the last button, and Wonho moved to pat Hyungwon's back or put his hand on his shoulder when Kihyun stepped in between them, smacking Wonho's hand down, his own shirt half unbuttoned.

"He doesn't like to be touched."

"Oh," Wonho said, blinking, distraught as he backed up. "I'm sorry, I didn't meant to- I just wanted to see if-"

"Change into your uniform," Kihyun instructed, his voice cool as he moved back toward his own bed, throwing his shirt off and grabbing his clean shirt. "We need to leave in a few minutes."

"Oh. All right..." Wonho replied, hesitated before casting a look over at Kihyun and copying his actions, unbuttoning his shirt and setting it off to the side before picking up his uniform shirt and sliding it over his head.

When he'd finished dressing, he turned to see Kihyun already clothed, Hyungwon just putting his last sock on before sliding his feet into his shoes and standing up.

"C'mon," Kihyun said before exiting the room, Hyungwon followed closely behind him.

Wonho bit his lip before sighing and following them out into the hallway, scared that in one day, he'd messed everything up, but he wasn't sure why the idea bothered him as much as it did.


	17. Chapter 17

When they got to the cafeteria, Jooheon was standing on top of the table, shouting at a different table.

"Yeah? You just keep sitting over there and laughing at us? You think we're a joke? You think I'm a joke? Come on over here and I'll show you who's a joke! What, afraid that I'll punch your nose in?"

Kihyun noticed some of the institution staff making their way over to the table and quickened his pace. "Yo, Jooheon, come on down already. Stop being an idiot."

Jooheon glared down at Kihyun. "What, you think I'm a joke too?"

"I think you're being stupid and reckless," Kihyun replied. "And if you get off the table, I'll tell you what else I think of you."

Jooheon growled at Kihyun before jumping off the table and stomping over to Kihyun. "Listen here, shortie-"

"No, you listen to  _me_ ," Kihyun snapped, his tone low and his words quick. "If you don't calm down right this second, the ward guards are going to restrain you and sedate you again like last time you blew up. Remember how it felt, getting a needle in your neck and waking up with a headache? So unless you want to be rolled away on a stretcher again, I suggest you take a deep breath, sit down at the table, and start eating your breakfast."

Jooheon glared at Kihyun, snarling, before he sat down at the table, slamming himself down on the bench, and grabbed his utensils in his hands, glaring down at the table.

"Good Jooheon," Kihyun sat, sitting down next to Jooheon, watching as the guards in light grey uniforms stopped advancing toward their table. "Now eat your oatmeal like a good little boy."

"I've had about enough of your bullshit, Kihyun-" Jooheon began, turning toward Kihyun, but he stopped as Hyungwon silently descended into the seat next to Kihyun. "Hey, he looks like even more of a ghost than he normally does."

"Something happen?" Minhyuk asked with a concerned half-smile half-frown as he sat down next to Hyungwon. Wonho took the empty seat next to Shownu.

"I can't say exactly what happened last night, but Kihyun and Hyungwon woke up in the same bed," Wonho said with a nervous smile, trying to lighten the air with a joke and maybe figure out who he had available as allies.

"You know how intimate panic attacks in the middle of the night can be," Kihyun said dryly, and Minhyuk looked between Kihyun and Hyungwon.

"Hey, is that true? Did you have a panic attack?"

Hyungwon was zoning out, stirring his oatmeal with a mindless spoon, drawing circles in the substance.

"Hyungwon?"

He looked over at Minhyuk. "What?"

"Did you have a panic attack last night?" Minhyuk's lips had settled into a frown.

_What did I do to deserve his worry? Why did it seem like yesterday, everybody hated me, and today, I'm the center of their universe?_

"I'm fine," Hyungwon mumbled. From what he'd experienced with his parents, everybody was always concerned at first, wanting to help, telling him that if he just told them what had happened, they could help and make everything better. But then they didn't want to hear anymore, they wanted to stop hearing about it, wanted him to stop doing whatever he was doing to ruin the image they had of their perfect son.

Kihyun said nothing. If Hyungwon didn't want to talk about it, he didn't want to talk about it. But Kihyun made eye contact with Minhyuk nonetheless and gave a slight nod, pursing his lips, and Minhyuk got the message.

"I've got to show you my notebook today," Minhyuk announced to Hyungwon, grinning and scooting a tiny bit closer. "I've been working on drawing our teacher all week, and I think I finally got the nose down right. It's hard cause it's got this little hook, but trust me, when you see it..."

Minhyuk's voice trailed off as he rambled throughout breakfast, filling the uncomfortable quiet at the table. Minhyuk also forced Hyungwon to stop shaping his oatmeal into artistic symbols, instructing him to eat some of it instead, and by the time breakfast had ended, Hyungwon seemed a little less pale, and his frown had settled into a neutral expression.

Wonho's frown had grown, however. He didn't understand what was going on, but he knew one thing: whatever was happening had something to do with Hyungwon, and he needed to talk with him to find out exactly what.


	18. Chapter 18

Wonho had asked Hyungwon to walk with him back to their room, letting everyone else get ahead of them before Wonho began walking, Hyungwon quiet at his side.

"Look, I don't get what's going on here, but you've had something against me from day one," Wonho said, stopping, and Hyungwon stopped beside him. "You said I did something to you when I'd never even seen you before. But- that doesn't really matter. That's not why I wanted to talk with you. I just wanted to clear things up since we got off on the right foot. Can we just call a truce and let bygones be bygones?" He smiled hesitantly. He knew what smile he was wearing because he'd seen it a lot reflected back at him in the mirror at the gym. People loved his smile.

"Maybe when you stop looking at me like I'm not human," Hyungwon muttered quietly, and Wonho's smile faltered.

"I'm sor- what?"

Hyungwon bit his lip and waited a few moments before looking up and exhaling. "I'm...sorry. I haven't been very fair to you..."

_I just want him to stop looking at me like that. Like I'm something that belongs in a cage or a laboratory, something that should be cut open and studied._

"I..." Hyungwon began, but he began to feel light-headed, and his train of thought was racing down the tracks away from him. "I..."

"You what?" Wonho asked just before Hyungwon collapsed.

Wonho's shock counteracted his reflexes, and he failed to catch him, instead crouching down next to him. "Hyungwon? Hyungwon?"

Minhyuk came trotting back from down the corridor, looking like he'd remembered something he'd wanted to tell one of them, when he took in the situation. "Oh, he passed out again. Hasn't happened in a few days so I can't say I'm surprised," he observed calmly, and Wonho gawked at him.

"Isn't this bad? I mean, he fainted and hit his head-"

"He wouldn't have hit his head if you'd have caught him," Minhyuk said disapprovingly, clucking his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

"How was I supposed to know-"

"Just pick him up and put him over your shoulder. We need to get back to our rooms," Minhyuk said.

Wonho had no choice but to pick Hyungwon up and along the unconscious boy over his shoulder.

***

When Hyungwon came to, he was in their room, and Wonho was on the ground.

"Hey," Wonho said with a smile, panting as he lowered himself for another push-up. "You're awake. That's good." He grunted as he went down for another push-up. "How's your head?"

"It...hurts...How'd you know?" Hyungwon asked, frowning as he gingerly prodded the back of his head with two fingers.

Wonho laughed nervously, almost dropping himself onto the ground. "Lucky guess, I suppose..."  _Definitely not because I let you fall._ He finished off one more push-up before sitting up with his back against the bed, inhaling and exhaling, enjoying the strong beating of his heart in his chest.

"Sorry, I try to do my exercise before bed, but I missed it last night and I felt out of shape," Wonho said, his lips lifting in a smile. There was something about the blood pumping through his veins that just made him feel alive and healthy. "You're really feeling all right?"

"Yeah..." Hyungwon studied Wonho carefully, somewhat interested. "I guess...I should have warned you. I might, um, pass out occasionally. But it's fine, it's normal. For me, I mean. I have a condition. Like, a medical one, I mean."

Wonho looked over, smiling at Hyungwon, who seemed to be struggling to speak. "Minhyuk might have filled me in a bit."

"Oh." Hyungwon looked down, and Wonho couldn't tell what he was thinking.

"I...um." Wonho cleared his throat, and Hyungwon looked back up. "I wanted to apologize to you. I, um, I work with a lot of different people as a trainer at the gym, and everybody has their own story and their own problems. And...working with them...it never made any difference to me what they looked like, what body type they had, any of that. And...I feel like...I feel like I may have made you feel uncomfortable or ashamed of yourself, and as someone who works to build other people up physically and in terms of their self-confidence, I..." Wonho bit his lip. "I feel really horrible about it...and I'm...ashamed of myself...that I would hurt your feelings...even inadvertently...not that I'm trying to make excuses for myself, I just-"

"It's okay," Hyungwon said from the other side of the room, looking down and picking at something on his blanket. "It's not a big-"

"But it is," Wonho insisted. "You were struggling, and I...instead of helping you, I not only turned away but made you feel like there's something wrong with you. It's just who you are. As a personal trainer..." He paused. "Just, as me, as who I am...it's my job to support you." He looked over at Hyungwon. "So...can you forget that I messed up? Can we just start over and be friends?"

Hyungwon looked over at Wonho in shock. "You want...to be friends...with me?"

Wonho nodded, smiling encouragingly. "Please?"

"But you're- I'm messed up and you're, well you're not-"

"Pretty please?" Wonho tried again, batting his eyelashes.

Hyungwon sucked in his bottom lip. "Is this like a pity thing? You just think I need a friend because I was crying last night?" Hyungwon conveniently left out the part where he almost stopped breathing.

"Nah." Wonho was still smiling, trying to convince Hyungwon of his sincerity, and he couldn't rightly blame anyone but himself for making Hyungwon so doubtful in the first place. "I don't really understand why I'm here or what's going on, but...I'd like to make the best of it, and I feel like I'd be missing out if we didn't become friends."

"...you're really trying to force this friendship, aren't you," Hyungwon commented, but Wonho grinned when he saw a small but reluctant smile hiding on Hyungwon's lips.

"I'm calling that a yes," Wonho said.

Hyungwon just smiled, and the fact that he didn't deny it seemed to make it true.


	19. Chapter 19

"No, you're not actually doing a push-up at all," Wonho said, laughing as Hyungwon struggled to do something in the approximation of a push-up (which looked more like he was picking a fight with the floor). "You need to bend your arms at the elbow and actually...you know... _push_ _up_."

"I don't think I have enough arm strength," Hyungwon muttered, defeated, as he collapsed on the floor.

"You have to work up your strength a little every day," Wonho said with a sympathetic smile, rubbing Hyungwon's back in circles. "I'll help you out, okay?"

"Fine," Hyungwon muttered. "I'll do your stupid push-ups."

"And sit-ups," Wonho added. "And some planks, maybe some leg lifts-"

"No?" Hyungwon tried, but Wonho just smacked him lightly on the back.

"Yep! You're my new workout buddy from now on, okay? You keep me honest about my workout schedule and I'll help you start building up muscle mass."

Hyungwon blew out a breathy laugh. He didn't believe that Wonho needed anyone to convince him to work out. He seemed very dedicated. "Fine," Hyungwon said, not because he enjoyed doing push-ups, but because it gave him an excuse to work on their friendship. And besides, hadn't Dr. Irving told him that a healthy body was important for a healthy mind or something like that?

_And maybe if I start working out, I'll tire myself out more so I won't dream._

"Just be ready to catch me if I pass out," Hyungwon said, not looking forward to the prospect of working out each night.

Wonho just laughed, sounding anxious. "Of course I'll catch you. I'm a personal trainer. 100%, definitely will catch. You can count on me."

Kihyun entered the room, giving them each a strange look. He'd just come from his shower, and his hair was still wet, water droplets hitting the ground as he paused. "What's going on?"

Wonho grinned up at Kihyun, already having forgotten how cold Kihyun had been to him earlier. "Workout session! C'mon, join us!"

"No."

"All right, we tried," Wonho said easily, and Hyungwon gave him an exasperated look.

"You wouldn't shut up until I agreed to do your stupid push-ups, and he gets off easy with just a simple no?"

Wonho grinned, guilty. "Look at the time, gotta change into my pajamas."

Hyungwon huffed, and Kihyun sat down on his bed, keeping an eye on Hyungwon as the taller quickly changed as well, sitting down on his own bed.

"Feeling all right?" Kihyun asked. It was a general question, about Hyungwon passing out earlier, but also a more specific question as to whether Hyungwon felt all right about going to sleep.

Hyungwon bit his lip. "I'll be fine," he said, laying down.

"Don't worry," Kihyun said, laying down in his own bed. "I won't let you die in the middle of the night."

"Okay. Thanks."

"Mmhm."

Kihyun remained quiet. He had his right arm behind his head and his left hand held up, blocking the light from the ceiling. He stared at the jagged scar running across his palm like some twisted palm line meant to divine his future. The scar was thick and ropy, having healed a long time ago, but not so long ago that the event had faded in Kihyun's memory. He wondered what sort of future the scar would predict. Violence? Trauma? Pain?

"Good night, Kihyun," Hyungwon said softly from the other side of the room.

The lights went out, and Kihyun lost sight of his left hand.


	20. Chapter 20

"I'm telling you, I have as much a right to stand on this desk as they do to shove me in this bloody excuse of a classroom and watch me with their cameras and tell me when I can eat and sleep and piss!"

Hyungwon was watching Jooheon, who was standing on his desk and screaming at the camera in the corner of the room. Their teacher had left the classroom as soon as Jooheon had started yelling, and they'd all heard the automatic lock of the door behind him, sealing them all in.

"Come down here and face me, faceless bastards!" he yelled, shaking a fist.

"Jooheon," Shownu, his roommate, tried as he moved toward Jooheon slowly, reaching out a hand to help Jooheon down. "Jooheon, try to-"

"Don't tell me to calm down!" Jooheon yelled, smacking Shownu's hand away. "Everyone's always telling me to frickin calm down! Well, I don't want to! How's that?"

"Jooheon, this isn't proving anything," Shownu continued to reason. He was used to Jooheon's outbreaks, and he knew that if he didn't talk him down soon, Jooheon would become violent and lash out, most likely breaking classroom fixtures or turning on his fellow classmates. "All that's going to end up happening is that we get moved to S-wing or T-wing or whatever's the next one to fill up. We won't get to eat breakfast in the cafeteria. They might turn the lights off earlier. All that's going to happen is that we're all going to get punished, and the people you're yelling at aren't going to be affected at all."

"That's the problem, isn't it?" Jooheon replied angrily. "That a bunch of assholes behind their screens think they have any sort of right to try and fix us when they don't bloody understand what makes you and me tick. They don't know how it feels, Shownu." Jooheon flexed his hand, staring down at it. "There's all this anger inside. In my blood, in my bones. And telling me to calm down doesn't fix the frickin problem. It doesn't make it go away. It just makes it build up and build up and I'm just drowning in all this anger that I'm just never supposed to use, that I'm just supposed to  _ignore_?" He laughed maniacally. "Try ignoring your dead brother, Shownu! Then tell me to ignore what's in my blood and in my bones!"

Shownu's facial muscles clenched, and everyone watching knew that Jooheon had crossed a line. "Fine," Shownu said, his voice quiet, flat. "Do what you want. I won't stop you."

He walked to the back of the classroom and sat down against the wall.

"You can't stop me," Jooheon snapped. "None of you can. Bunch of weaklings. Kihyun's a midget and this other kid is a bloody skeleton-"

Hyungwon flinched but didn't bother replying.

"-and he's a jabberhead-"

Changkyun's lips tightened.

"-and Minhyuk's like a flipping light switch, on again, off again, and the only kid who's got any meat on his bones at all thinks he doesn't even frickin belong here," Jooheon snarled, and Wonho watched with a furrowed eyebrow. "Little boy wants to go home to his mommy," Jooheon mocked, and Wonho frowned.

Hyungwon stood up, pushing back his chair softly. He didn't like confrontation. He wasn't built for it. But Shownu was out of the picture, and Wonho still wasn't really up to speed, and everyone else was just content to sit around and watch like it was the newest episode of some TV drama.  _Jooheon Yelling At The World, Episode 34._

"Jooheon-" Hyungwon began, moving closer to the other boy, whose eyes followed him, narrowed into slits. He didn't know what he was supposed to say. He didn't have a big speech prepared or answers to any of Jooheon's questions. He just wanted Jooheon to stop yelling and get off the desk.

But whatever he'd been about to do never happened. Instead, his body absorbed the shock of a blow, and he crumpled to the ground.

"Bloody skeleton," Jooheon muttered, rubbing his fist, his knuckles tearing slightly from the bone-on-bone contact.


	21. Chapter 21

Kihyun scowled, storming over to Jooheon and smacking his calf since he couldn't reach his chest. "You're angry at the people in charge? The frick do I care! Be angry all you want! But punching one of  _us_?" Kihyun's wintry glare was fixed on Jooheon's turbulent eyes. "I thought you were over that shit."

"You can't tell me what to do, shortie!" Jooheon yelled back, but there was a different light in his eyes, one of panic. He knew he'd screwed up, but he was too proud to admit it. He had been relishing in the warmth of fury, but now it was all fading, spilling from his veins, emptying him of his adrenaline all too quickly. There was something that felt good about the rage, the anger; when he released it, he felt...powerful. But this was a different feeling. Guilt. And it didn't feel nearly as good.

"Get off the damn desk, Jooheon!"

Jooheon snarled at Kihyun but jumped down, immediately approaching Kihyun chest-to-chest in challenge. "You're not the boss of me or any of us. You can't even control yourself. You think something gives you the right to tell us what to do, huh? Huh?"

Kihyun gritted his teeth, his eyes narrowing. "I didn't think I  _had_  to tell you what to do. I thought that you could control yourself. Pity that we were both wrong, now isn't it?"

Jooheon gripped Kihyun's collar, lifting him up slightly, but Kihyun didn't react. "Watch your tongue, you little rat."

"What are you going to do, slag me in the head too?" Kihyun asked viciously, his tone scathing.

Changkyun, meanwhile, was hurrying over to Minhyuk, both of them crouching down on the floor next to Hyungwon.

Wonho watched on, concentrating mostly on Kihyun and Jooheon, waiting to see if he was needed to break the two apart.

"Maybe I would if I thought it would knock any sanity into your skull," Jooheon snapped back, dropping Kihyun, and the two glared at each other.

"Shut up you two," Minhyuk said without looking up. "Shit, shit, shit-"

"We need some ward guards," Changkyun said anxiously, standing up and speaking toward the camera. "And medical assistance."

"It's just a punch," Jooheon said, his tone dull, hanging his head slightly. "We don't need a damn SWAT team. Let the skeleton suck it up."

Minhyuk looked up at Jooheon with thinned lips and angry eyes. "It's not  _just a punch_ , you idiot. You didn't hit him in the face, you nailed him in the side of the head."

"So?" Jooheon asked, crossing his arms, but he gave himself away by biting his bottom lip. He was worried.

" _So_ , if he's got any internal bleeding, he could end up seizing," Minhyuk said, clenching his jaw. "Damn it, Jooheon, why'd you have to punch him?"

"Don't-" Jooheon began, throwing his arms up. His automatic reflex had been to say  _Don't blame this on me,_  but he knew that he deserved full blame for any consequences that might come about. He could feel them turning against him, and he felt trapped. "I can't- I don't- it just, it happened, I didn't mean to, just...in the moment...I-"

Jooheon was cut off by the sound of the door's lock being disengaged. The door opened to reveal a small squad of ward guards dressed in a dull gray, followed by two men carrying a stretcher.

"We're here to take Chae Hyungwon down to the medical bay," one of them announced. "Will all present please clear to the sides of the room."

Minhyuk made a face before sending a last worried glance at Hyungwon. Then he moved away, his shoulder blades touching the wall behind him. Changkyun followed, then Kihyun.

Wonho and Jooheon remained frozen.

"If you resist, we will be forced to sedate you," the same man from earlier repeated. He looked to be in his mid-twenties. Not altogether that much older than them.

Wonho followed the others.

Jooheon didn't. He thought for a moment that if he took a needle in the neck, it would help to equalize the guilt he felt. Like some sort of penance for his actions.

"Don't be an idiot, Jooheon," Kihyun said quietly from the wall. He could be angry at Jooheon but still care about his well-being in the long run.

Jooheon hesitated before joining them against the wall.

Then the men in the gray uniforms lifted Hyungwon's limp body onto the stretcher and carted him away.


	22. Chapter 22

"I said I'm fine," Hyungwon muttered, batting a hand at Minhyuk, who was trying to get a better look at Hyungwon's head. "And you hovering over me isn't going to change anything."

Minhyuk pouted but stayed seated in the desk next to Hyungwon.

The doctors on call had examined Hyungwon and determined an absence of internal bleeding, releasing him back into their classroom several hours after the incident. Classes had been cancelled for the day, and they'd all been locked inside the classroom. At lunch time, they'd remained at their desks instead of forming a circle. Eating lunch without Hyungwon, despite his lack of definitive presence, was...odd. Discomforting.

That said, the incident hadn't bothered everyone to the same degree. Minhyuk was worried about his deskmate, but Changkyun seemed oblivious to the whole thing, hunching down in his desk and whispering about little buggers that crawled under your fingernails, killing all the cells until your fingernails turned black and fell off. Shownu was responsive but quietly restrained, and Kihyun seemed to be worried more about Jooheon than Hyungwon. Wonho remained warily neutral, as he hadn't really had time to get to know Jooheon, and he felt like automatically taking Hyungwon's side was unfair.

Not that there were sides. While the event had been out of the ordinary, it wasn't the first time it had happened. They'd all caught a fist from Jooheon one time or another. The smart ones managed to avoid a second. Hyungwon was just the first to actually black out from it. Which wasn't that surprising in itself considering how thin he was.

Back in the classroom, Hyungwon looked past Minhyuk, taking in Jooheon's body language. Guilt, anger, regret, frustration. Hyungwon didn't know how to handle the boy. He wasn't much upset about taking the punch. He'd deserved it, he thought, for being so stupid as to approach a reckless, out of control boy with anger issues and a penchant for violence. But he didn't want what had happened to drive a wedge between Jooheon and the others or even between Jooheon and himself.

When class was dismissed despite no class having actually taken place, Hyungwon hurried to follow Jooheon out the door, ignoring Minhyuk calling his name.

"Jooheon," Hyungwon said, panting slightly and already out of breath. He'd never had much stamina.

Jooheon turned, scowling at him. "What, you came back for round two?"

"Uh, no," Hyungwon mumbled, trying to figure out exactly what he needed to say to diffuse the situation. "I...um...I should have just......good shot," he finally said, and Jooheon's eyebrow shot up.

"I'm sorry, what was that, skeleton?"

"Your punch. It's very, um, strong. I've still got a headache. And I'll have some bruises if I'm lucky." Hyungwon sucked his bottom lip in. He was screwing this whole thing up. "I just, I just meant to say, it's fine, I don't really mind-"

"Did I ever say I was going to apologize to you?" Jooheon snapped, and Hyungwon squinted at Jooheon.

"Well, no, but you looked sad today and I don't want it to be because of me getting in the way of your fist."

What Hyungwon wanted to say was that, he knew what it felt like to be alone. He'd been alone for a while now, surrounded by faces but separated by things he wasn't supposed to say, and Jooheon was alone too, isolated by rage. He lashed out because it was the only way he could connect with people. Hyungwon had tried to reach others too by telling them what he saw, but he'd realized in the end that it only shut him farther away. That was how Jooheon's rage worked as well; when he finally lashed out, he was left more alone than when he'd started. But violence seemed to be the only way he knew.

Hyungwon didn't blame Jooheon. The punch didn't hurt that much because Hyungwon had blacked out almost immediately, and although he had a headache, he didn't really blame Jooheon for it. "I just..." Hyungwon fumbled with his words. "I guess...I wanted to say thank you."

Jooheon's laugh cut sharply through the air. "You want to thank me? Is this a joke? Do you really want me to cause some internal bleeding this time?"

"No, I'm not really a fan of pain so I'd prefer if you didn't hit me again, but..." Hyungwon licked his bottom lip, nervous. He didn't like hanging his vulnerabilities outside to dry, but the only way to stop being alone was to open himself up to the only people who had a shot at understanding him. "If you punched me because you don't like me...Thanks for being direct about it at least and not, you know, talking behind my back or any of that stuff." That was what Hyungwon really hated, when people were nice to his face but scathing when his head turned. Duplicity.

Jooheon snorted. "I don't do shit like that. What do I look like, a teenage girl?" He snorted again, rubbing his knuckles, and Hyungwon was glad to see that the frustrated set to his shoulders was gone. Jooheon was once again the overconfident, somewhat obnoxious guy eager to throw the next punch. "You're welcome for doing you a favor," Jooheon said, tilting his head up slightly. "Skeleton."

Hyungwon smiled at Jooheon. "Thanks, Jooheon."

Jooheon frowned at Hyungwon, having been unsuccessful at getting a rise out of him, but Hyungwon took note of the slight flush in Jooheon's cheeks, as he was embarrassed and didn't know how to handle the spindly boy. "Stop talking to me like we're friends."

"Okay, Jooheon."

"I mean it! Say my name one more time and I'll-"

"Sure thing, Jooheon."

"Skeleton!"

"Yes, Jooheon?"

The two walked back to their dorm rooms, Jooheon yelling at Hyungwon the whole time, Hyungwon trying not to wince as Jooheon's yelling exacerbated his headache.

It was another unlikely friendship in the most unlikely of places.


	23. Chapter 23

The week passed by quickly after the incident. Hyungwon was dragged into a before-bed exercise routine with Wonho every night (which Kihyun managed to avoid at all costs), and Jooheon managed to refrain from punching anyone else.

The days melted into one another until Friday. Then it seemed as though time stopped.

"No class today," Kihyun reminded them as they woke up.

"Why not?" Wonho asked, having not paid much attention to the idle breakfast table conversation. Although they hadn't been at their normal breakfast table lately, as they'd earned a demerit for Jooheon's outbreak and had lost the right to eat in the cafeteria for a week.

"Family visitation," Kihyun said.

"Oh," Wonho said, blinking and remaining in his pajamas as the other two changed.

"First and third Friday of every month," Kihyun said, finishing with his shirt buttons and proceeding to pull on his pants. He looked over to the tallest boy in the room. "Is your family coming?"

Hyungwon looked up, fumbling with his shirt buttons still. "I- I don't know."

"Do you want them to come?" Kihyun asked.

"I don't know."

Kihyun shrugged, nodding to himself. "That's sort of how it is. I love my mom, because she's my mom I mean, but I also don't want to ever see her again." Kihyun paused. "Or...I do...but...when she's better. She's the one who should be in here." His eyes gently traced the scar marring his left hand before looking up at Wonho. "I guess you don't know if your family's coming, either."

Wonho shrugged, leaning back against the wall. "I'm not sure. I haven't seen them in a year since I left home to get a job at the gym. I don't even know if they know where I am right now."

 _Trust me, they know,_  Kihyun thought to himself, but he just nodded along with Wonho. It was always a different story; he'd run away from home or they'd grown apart or they'd moved without him. But none of them were the truth, that Wonho's parents knew where he was an kept up with his condition from outside the institution. They cared about him and loved him, even if they couldn't understand him, even if they couldn't understand why the boy they'd raised from infancy was suddenly a stranger to them and they a stranger to him.

***

They joined up with M-wing in their classroom for breakfast, but since class was cancelled for the day, they were alone in the room without their teacher. Which was fine, since nobody really liked him anyway.

"They'll keep us in here until one of our parents gets here. Then they'll let us go, one by one, and when the first guy gets back, the next guy gets to go. That's how it usually works, at least," Minhyuk explained to Hyungwon, who nodded.

"Did you hear from your mom?" Hyungwon asked softly, knowing it was a touchy topic with Minhyuk, but the latter bobbed his head eagerly.

"She wrote me the other day, saying she was clean and that she'd make it for sure this time," Minhyuk said, grinning and then biting his lip to try to keep himself from grinning, but his smile broke through nonetheless. "She's probably not permanently clean, I mean, maybe just a week, but still, that's progress, right?"

Hyungwon nodded but didn't say anything. It was too late to stop Minhyuk from getting his hopes up at this point. The only thing he could do was hope that Mrs. Lee actually came.

But Minhyuk had mentioned something Hyungwon hadn't been aware of. If she was writing to him, presumably the letters were distributed in class, but then...why was no one writing to Hyungwon?

Had they abandoned him entirely?

The door unlocked and a ward gard hovered in the door frame. "Lee Jooheon, you have a visitor."

Jooheon frowned slightly but stood up. According to Minhyuk, his parents came irregularly, and usually only when they needed to tell him something.

Jooheon left the room, and the door locked behind him.


	24. Chapter 24

Jooheon entered the room roughly fifteen minutes later looking preoccupied and slightly distressed,  neither of which suited him.

"How'd it go?" Minhyuk asked, and Jooheon looked up, a frown on his face.

***

_Jooheon sat down in the chair across the glass from his mother. Despite the institution's best attempts to make the place seem inviting and welcoming, the place still functioned like a prison in most aspects, but Jooheon had grown used to it._

_His mother had not._

_She eyed the glass with distrusting eyes before picking up the phone on her side of the glass. Jooheon picked his up and met her eyes through the glass, waiting for her to say the first words._

_"Jooheon," she said._

_He waited._

_"How have you been?" she asked, biting her lip, her eyes shifting away from him._

_"Fine," he said, wanting to skip past the small talk. "What's wrong? You're hiding something."_

_She sighed, meeting his eyes once more, disappointed. "Can't we just- can't we just talk for a little bit first? Have a nice conversation?"_

_Jooheon snorted. "When do we ever have nice conversations? Last time you were here was to tell me that you wanted me to consider my options for college even though you doubt any colleges will want to accept me because this whole thing will be on my record and my grades suck."_

_She exhaled, pinching her nose with her left hand, the one not holding the phone up to her right ear. "I was just encouraging you to think about your future-"_

_"What you implied was that I better fix my behavior so I could-"_

_"Jooheon-"_

_"-go out into the world to make you and him proud-"'_

_"Jooheon-"_

_"-even though we all know that you aren't-"_

_"Your father died."_

_Jooheon stopped talking._

_"Two days ago," she hurried on, biting her lip once more and adjusting herself in her chair on the other side of the glass. "They said it was a heart attack." She played with the cord connecting the phone to the wall, avoiding his eyes. "I know you two didn't-"_

_"He's gone?" Jooheon asked, holding his breath._

_"Yes," she replied succinctly. "He's gone."_

_"Good," Jooheon said, and she looked up, pain in her eyes._

_"I know you two weren't close and you didn't get along-"_

_"It was more than not getting along, Mom! He hit me! More than once! And when I got strong enough to start fighting back, suddenly that's a problem, suddenly I'm labeled as_ violent  _and_ aggressive  _and_ a hazard to others' safety! _He was a hazard to_ my _safety! You expect me to what, cry for him? Did he ever cry for me? I end up in a mental institution for breaking his arm and that's fine, but when he has himself a heart attack because he drinks and smokes and eats like every supper is his last supper,_ then _I'm supposed to feel bad?"_

_Jooheon curled his lip up in disgust at the petite woman sitting on the other side of the glass. It wasn't that he didn't like his mom; he did, in a lot of ways. She'd never stood up for him, but he didn't really blame her. Her husband would have snapped her like a twig. She was obedient like she was supposed to be, and she did what he told her to do. There were times when Jooheon wished that she would have been stronger, for him, for herself, but at the end of the day, she was the mom he had, and he loved her._

_At the end of the day, Jooheon's dad was the dad he had, and he loved him too in a way, but a different way, a way that he would never express, a way that Jooheon didn't even realize until he knew that his dad was gone._

_He missed him, and he wasn't sure why._

_Jooheon waited for her to say something, but she was still staring at him half-hopefully, as though she wanted him to say something about his dad that didn't sound petty and unforgiving._

_But the words wouldn't come, and their nice little conversation ended as Jooheon slammed the phone back on its rack and kicked back the chair, leaving the room._

***

"My dad's dead," Jooheon said, his voice flat, his eyes a little larger than normal, disbelieving in their vague gaze.

"Isn't that what you wanted?" Kihyun asked from the back of the room, not in his normal snide tone.

"Yeah," Jooheon said, but his real thoughts were,  _That's what I_ thought _I wanted._

He didn't know anymore, but it was too late to change that. Now, there was a goodbye trapped in his throat, one he wouldn't get to deliver.


	25. Chapter 25

Changkyun was next. He was gone a good bit longer than Jooheon had been, about half an hour. The difference in time was accounted for by the differences in their moms.

***

_"Changie!"_

_Changkyun smiled at the woman on the other side of the glass, holding the phone tight up against his ear so he wouldn't miss anything. "Hi Mom," he said, his eyes bright._

_She tilted her head, and a few strands of her hair fell in her face. She wasn't wearing makeup, and Changkyun was glad because he honestly thought she looked prettier this way. She was young, as she'd had Changkyun when she'd been just nineteen, and even now she was young for a mother at thirty-five. "How's my little boy been?"_

_Changkyun flushes from the embarrassing epithet but smiled nonetheless since he knew their time was limited. "I'm doing well, Mom. I'm eating a lot and everything. Staying in shape. Doing my best in school." Except math, but she didn't really need to know that._

_"That's good, Changie," she said, and her voice was warm and true. "You know I'm so proud of you, right?"_

_Changkyun nodded, mostly because he knew he was supposed to, but he wasn't really sure if those words were as true as the others. He knew since she'd showed up this week, her boyfriend must be out of town, and she was always a lot more like the mom Changkyun knew and loved when her boyfriend was out of the picture. But when he came back, the makeup would go back on, and she wouldn't seem so young and sweet anymore. But maybe... "Are you still dating him?"_

_She sighed, her lips twisting downward at the edges. "Do we have to have this conversation, Changkyun? Can't we just-"_

_"So you are?"_

_"He's a good guy," she defended, her eyes hardening she she crossed her left arm over her chest. "I know that you don't like him, but he wants what's best for me and if you wanted what's best for me too you'd-"_

_"I'd tell you that you don't need a boyfriend to know that you're young and talented and beautiful and amazing, Mom," Changkyun said, his eyebrows furrowed as he talked quickly, trying to get his words in before she invalidated them. "I know you feel like you missed some of your youth raising me, but you're still amazing and you don't need a boyfriend to make it true-"_

_"You're sixteen, Changkyun," she said, pursing her lips and sinking into her chair a little bit. "You think that you understand everything but you don't, okay? I know how to take care of myself so you let me worry about me, all right?" She sighed, and Changkyun frowned. In his mind, it had always been that he would worry about his mom and she would worry about him, but maybe it wasn't that equal. "You know I worry about you too," she said softly as though sensing his thoughts, and Changkyun shifted in his chair uneasily._

_"I told you that I'm doing okay here. We got a new kid who's all right. Besides that, it's just the same old same old."_

_She smiled, and a few wrinkles appeared on the edges of her lips and eyes, wrinkles she didn't like her boyfriend seeing, but Changkyun thought they made her more real. "And the monsters?"_

_Changkyun looked down, his grip on the phone loosening. "You know," he said, and he hated that he sounded so pathetic and needy. "Of course they're there. They're always there, even if you guys don't see them. I mean, I don't see them either, but I know they're there, that's the difference."_

_"And what monsters have you been thinking of lately?" she asked, and he looked up, biting his lip, waiting to see if she was going to tease him about it, but she just gave him an encouraging look, and he inhaled quickly, turning his left hand so his fingernails faced himself._

_"They're...they're little...and they'll...they'll burrow underneath your fingernails...and they'll kill the skin...I think they lay eggs and that's what kills the skin...and then your fingernail turns black and it'll fall right off," he said, starting slow but picking up the pace. "And because they laid eggs, once the babies hatch, they'll spread to your other fingernails and keep laying more eggs...so...so you gotta be careful about touching things...doorknobs...stuff like that...cause you don't know if the person before you had some that got onto the doorknob cause then they'll get onto you and burrow in and start laying their eggs and you don't want that..."_

_She nodded, staring at Changkyun without casting a glance at her own fingernails. "Doorknobs, got it. I'll keep an eye out, okay, Changie?"_

_Chankgyun nodded quickly. He worried about his mom staying safe because only he knew what the monsters were and how they'd get you. He needed to tell his mom so she'd be safe too. "Okay, Mom. Don't forget. Doorknobs."_

_"Doorknobs," she repeated seriously before smiling slowly at Changkyun. "Changie, our time is almost up," she said before kissing her thumb and pressing it against the glass._

_Changkyun hesitated, staring at his thumb and weighing the odds that there were already monsters underneath burrowing into his skin (and what if they got into his throat and started laying eggs there, too?) before quickly kissing his thumb and pressing it against the glass on top of his mom's thumb on the other side._

_They held their thumbs there for a second before she took hers away, standing up and adjusting her purse._

_"Will you be back next time?" Changkyun asked, sounding desperate again, but he couldn't worry about that now._

_"I'm sorry, I don't think I'll be able to make it," she said, glancing down at something, her shoe perhaps, and her hair swung in front of her face before she looked back up at Changkyun. "But I'll see you in a month, okay, sweetie?"_

_Changkyun fought to keep a frown off his lips, forcing a worried smile on instead. "Okay. Bye, Mom. I love you," he said, biting his lip as he waited to hear the words back._

_"Bye, Changkyun," she said, waving. "I love you." She hung up the phone._

_Changkyun sighed into the receiver, still holding on to it. He waited a long moment before slowly setting it back in its cradle on the wall, and by that time, he was alone with a ward guard._

***

"How is your mom doing?" Minhyuk, Changkyun's roommate, asked.

Changkyun was quiet for a moment as he tossed responses back and forth. "She's doing well. Still with her boyfriend. She won't make the next one but maybe next month."

"That sucks," Minhyuk said, frowning sympathetically. "But at least she came today, right? At least she cares about you."

"Yeah," Changkyun said, nodding as he slid down into his seat. "At least she still cares about me."

Any possible further conversation was abandoned as the ward guard stepped back into the room. "Chae Hyungwon."

Hyungwon startled in his seat. He'd weighed the odds of his parents visiting, but no matter how many times he re-ran it, they always came out firmly negative. He was an embarrassment to them. He'd been put in here so they could forget the social humiliation of their failed son. He was supposed to be a problem out of sight, out of mind.

So why were they here?


	26. Chapter 26

"Just have a seat," the ward guard instructed, and Hyungwon slowly set himself down in the metal folding chair. "Your visitors will be let in on the other side in a moment. You'll have half an hour to visit with them, although you don't have to use the full time allotment if you don't want to. You'll be talking with them over the phone - all you have to do is pick it up and it'll automatically connect. And when you're ready to leave, you can just hang the phone up, and your session will end. Do you have any questions?"

"Um..." Hyungwon's brain was still lagging behind a bit, his surprise overwhelming him temporarily. "Is...will our conversation be...recorded? Will Dr. Irving be listening?"

"We have a camera in each room for safety purposes, and I'll be in the room with you at all times to monitor the session, but none of the medical staff will pull the footage unless I believe your health has been threatened or if there is any content that could help improve your condition."

"Oh..okay," Hyungwon said. Of course there would be cameras. Where did he think he was?

"Are you ready to begin your visitation session?"

"I- yes," Hyungwon said, his eyes skittering around the edges of the room.

"You have the option to refuse if you wish," the guard said more gently. "Nobody's forcing you to see them."

"No, it's...it's fine. They're my parents. They love me," Hyungwon said, but the words came out sounding so hollow and contrived that even the guard didn't bother arguing with Hyungwon, just held a walkie talkie up to his lips with the dark gleam of pity in his eyes.

"You can send them in now. He's ready."

Hyungwon watched anxiously as the door on the other side opened, and his parents came in. He watched as his mother took a second to survey the room, scanning the sides and ceiling before setting her eyes on Hyungwon last. His father followed her in, giving the room a brief but disinterested once-over before sitting down in one of the chairs.

His mother took the seat nearest the phone.

Hyungwon had figured as much. Hoped otherwise, but expected it anyway.

She picked up the phone and stared at him with expectation shining in the sharp angles of her face and in the flatness of her eyes.

Hyungwon paused before picking up the phone, holding it in his hand a moment before bringing it close to his ear, but not so close that it kissed his skin.

Neither of them talked for a moment. Hyungwon wondered how many minutes had gone past. One? Two?

Twenty-nine?

Was that too much to hope for?

"Hyungwon," she finally said, understanding that he would not be the one to initiate the conversation.

He remained silent. Hyungwon was his name, not one he'd given himself, and it didn't demand a response. Not theoretically, at least. It wasn't a question, it wasn't a two-part statement-

" _Hyungwon_ ," she repeated, her painted fingernails tightening on the phone, her tone dark and demanding.

"Yes?" Hyungwon responded. It was funny how in just two weeks away from them, he'd forgotten a seemingly obvious fact. 'Hyungwon' always warranted a response; it may have been his name (by coincidence) but it was a leash and, when tugged, it demanded that he bark.

 _Just how high am I expected to jump?_  he had to wonder before mentally berating himself for asking such an insolent question. They were his parents; they had raised him, and they deserved his respect.

Some would have said that they deserved love, but that had never been a priority in the Chae household, just as it was money rather than happiness that drove the world onward day by day.

"You're not going to greet us?" she asked. Only with her, it was never  _asking;_ it was demanding, silently but strongly.

"Hello Mother, Father," Hyungwon said. He remembered the hands at his throat, suffocating him. He preferred the physical hands, he thought.


	27. Chapter 27

"Ask us how we're doing," she said in a tone that implied that he was stupid, like a dog that had forgotten how to sit and roll over after its owner had gone on vacation and hadn't been there to give it treats every day.

"How are you doing?"

"Let's just skip past all these banal frivolities," she snapped despite them being done on her suggestion.

Hyungwon shifted in his metal folding chair. It was starting to dig into his hip. He was positive that it would have been stabbing into each vertebrae had he not been sitting up straight, his back not even touching the back of the chair. Years of dinnertime chastisement had drilled it into him. All the manners and lessons were coming back to him. Funny that he would prefer a mental institution to his home.

House, he meant. Not home.

"Are you fixed yet?" she asked, and Hyungwon just blinked at her, mouth slightly agape at the horribly insensitive nature of her question, not that he should have been surprised knowing her. "Don't look at me like that. I gave birth to you," she reminded him, a fact that she never ceased to hold over him. "Are you finished with all your lies and your inappropriate behavior?"

"My...inappropriate behavior..." Hyungwon knew she wasn't talking about the narcolepsy. They'd been dealing with that for years. She'd taken Hyungwon to good, reputable doctors, had spoken directly with school nurses, made sure that everyone knew that Hyungwon had a capable mother who was placing her eldest son in capable hands. Hyungwon had always had the strange feeling that she'd enjoyed his narcolepsy, which didn't make sense to him, but it had always seemed as though she had enjoyed being able to control various aspects of his life and remind him, as always, that she was his mother and she would take care of him and that it was only with her care that he survived and felt even the barest imitation of happiness.

It was like he was trapped in Plato's cave, only he was never allowed to leave, and he was forced to acknowledge the shadows as reality, even if his mind believed otherwise.

Her words, words Hyungwon had grown distracted from, must have been directed towards his dreams. "Mother, you can't expect me to...to fully recover-" Saying the words pained him because in some sweet, innocent part of his heart, he wanted to believe that there was truly nothing wrong with him. "-in just two weeks, that's not-"

"So you're still having them," she deduced, and Hyungwon felt his back sink slightly before forcing himself to sit up straighter, stiffening his spine. "The dreams," she said, her lip curling slightly before she hid her distaste with a cool mask of disappointment.

"Yes," Hyungwon said. He didn't know what else to say. The idea of lying to his parents- attempting to lie to his parents - was frightening. And besides, if Dr. Irving  _did_  end up listening in, he'd wonder if Hyungwon were lying to him.

"I don't understand," she said, pursing her lips. They were coated in a dark lipstick. The color, along with her pinned hair and sleek grey blazer, gave off a professional aura. Hyungwon couldn't remember a single moment in which she'd appeared to him not as a high-profile prosecuting attorney but as a mother. "What did we do wrong, Hyungwon?" she asked. Her voice made her words sound vulnerable, but Hyungwon knew that it was just the lawyer within her telling her how to craft a more effective argument, to target Hyungwon's weaknesses and insecurities, to pin the guilt on him.

Hyungwon remained silent. He knew that she'd find a way to use his words against him, and he didn't have any words that he wanted turned into knives that could be firmly and efficiently slid into his back, the back that still wasn't touching the metal folding chair.

"We gave you everything," she said. Hyungwon's father was silent at her side. He was a supporting role. She was the one with the power in their household. "We provided a good education, good medical assistance. When you were diagnosed with-" She paused as though the thought pained her emotionally; Hyungwon knew it did not. "-with... _narcolepsy_..." She sniffed, raising her nose slightly. "...we did everything in our power to make sure you had everything you needed to grow up healthy." Some parents might have said  _happy_  instead of  _healthy_ , but not Hyungwon's mom. "We taught you, raised you, sheltered you, and you repay us by..." She paused, at this moment truly at a loss for words. "You repay us by making up lie after lie about someone trying to kill you in your sleep, and even after we changed the locks and took you to a therapist to make it stop, you continually  _insisted_  on embarrassing our family name."

"You have Hyewon," Hyungwon said weakly, mentioning his older sister. "Isn't she-"

"You are our oldest  _son_ , Hyungwon," she cut him off, her eyes narrowing. "Hyewon is suitable to marry off, but after your father, you are the man of the house. You will inherit the Chae assets. And I will not stand for you humiliating our family."

Hyungwon was quiet. He was hesitant to bring up Kyungwon, his younger brother. He didn't want to involve him in this mess, but he knew that it was impossible not to. With Hyungwon slowly but surely becoming an embarrassment to their family, all of his parents expectations would be placed on Kyungwon instead.

Hyungwon felt bad for his younger brother. Not bad, just...guilty. Hyungwon hadn't enjoyed growing up in a strict household where he felt responsibilities, obligations, and expectations always weighing down on him, but he'd known that it was his cross to bear. He'd had his entire life to adjust to that. But, Kyungwon...Kyungwon had been given more freedom. And now, that freedom would be taken away.

Because of Hyungwon. Because of the dreams in Hyungwon's head.

Hyungwon's mother spoke a bit more on how much Hyungwon had failed them before looking at him with a grimace. "I hope that next time we talk, you'll be over this whole thing." She put the phone back on the wall, not angrily or clumsily, but with quick, knowing movements. Then she stood up, waiting before Hyungwon's father got to his feet before heading toward the door. It opened, they left, and it shut.

"Goodbye Mother, goodbye Father," Hyungwon said into the phone, staring down at the thin metal counter that ran beneath the glass divider. "I love you," he said. Then he put the phone back on the wall with his long, gentle fingers and turned to the ward guard.

"How much time is left?"

The ward guard checked his watch, his expression not quite readable to Hyungwon, not that Hyungwon was analyzing him. "Twelve minutes."

"Can I stay here for those twelve minutes?" Hyungwon asked. He didn't want to go back to the room yet. He needed time to recover.

"I'm sorry," the ward guard said, looking sincerely apologetic. "The next patient's visitors are already here, and we try not to keep them waiting, and since your visitors left..."

"That's right, you said once I hang up the phone, it's over," Hyungwon echoed softly, looking down at the ground. He was quiet for a moment before looking back up. "Okay. I'm ready to go now."

The ward guard frowned but nodded as Hyungwon stood up, and he lead Hyungwon back to their classroom.


	28. Chapter 28

"Skeleton's back," Jooheon announced as Hyungwon walked through the door.

"Hi," Hyungwon said.

"How'd it go?" Minhyuk asked, almost bolting out of his chair as Hyungwon entered the room.

"Fine."

"Was it your mom or your dad or both or...?" Wonho began, curious but also twitchy. He still didn't know if he'd get a visit, and it was putting him on edge.

"Both."

"That's nice," Changkyun said, shrugging.

Hyungwon just sat down in his seat, folded his arms, and laid his head down.

"...or not," Changkyun amended, looking away with a twinge of discomfort.

"Son Hyunwoo?"

Shownu nodded and pushed back his seat, exiting the room, leaving it oddly quiet behind him.

***

Shownu got to the room to find his mom already inside.

"Hi, Mom," Shownu said with a soft smile after he'd picked up the phone.

"Shownu," she replied, her eyes crinkling at the edges. "How are you guys doing?"

"We're doing well," Shownu said, leaning on the counter slightly.

"And he's..." She trailed off, biting her lip, unable to hide the worry in her eyes.

Shownu just smiled reassuringly. "He's okay, Mom. I see him every now and then but he's doing all right."

"Good. Good..." She swallowed, trying to contain her emotion. "Anything interesting happen lately, Shownu?"

He laughed to himself. "Not much. You know how Jooheon can be. He's been a little twitchy lately. He punched the new kid yesterday, though, so he'll probably calm down for a little bit."

She frowned. "I remember when you came in with a black eye once. You said that it was from Jooheon, right?"

Shownu shrugged his shoulders, but there was a hint of a smirk on his face. "It's okay, Mom. We're friends. He just can't control himself all the time. But it's okay to be different, right?"

She nodded, her eyes shining as she looked at her only son. "Yes, Shownu. Different is okay. You know that I love you, right? No matter-" Her throat choked up a bit. "No matter what. And your dad loves you too, you know that?"

Shownu smiled, his eyes darting down as he played with his fingers. "He's in the hallway, right?"

She nodded. "He came to see you. He always does, you know. Just...it's hard on your dad...seeing you...and thinking about...how special you are." That's what she called it. Not  _a problem_  or  _wrong behavior._  She called it "special." Shownu wondered if the other kids in M-wing had parents who thought of them as "special" and not just mistakes, but he wasn't sure.

"I know," Shownu answered after a moment. He loved his dad, he really did, and he understood why his dad had such a hard time seeing him face-to-face and talking with him. The only times Shownu got to see his dad any more were in the few seconds that the door would stand ajar as his mom left, giving him an angled view into the hallway, where he'd see his dad staring back at him, and Shownu would smile, because he wanted his dad to know that he was happy and okay and that his dad didn't need to worry.

"Don't change, baby," she said, tracing a pattern on the glass because she couldn't smooth down his hair with the barrier between them. "I don't want to lose you. Any of you."

Shownu nodded. "I love you, Mom. And tell Dad that I said that I love him too, okay?"

She nodded before blowing Shownu a kiss, and he held his hand out, closing it around the invisible gift. Then he watched closely as she left the room, his eyes following her out the door and into the hallway, where they met his dad's eyes.

Shownu smiled, and the door closed.

He looked down at his hand, uncurling his fingers one by one to find his hand empty, as it always was.

Then he stood up and returned to the classroom.

***

"How was it?" Minhyuk asked, noticeably less excited than before. He was still antsy, tapping his foot up and down and up and down, but after the last few kids had come back in a worse state than they'd left in, he was anxious about asking.

"My mom's doing well," Shownu said with a smile. "My dad too, although I just talked to my mom."

Minhyuk nodded. "That's good. Good for them. That's nice," he rambled, biting his lip and staring at the door, waiting for the ward guard to come in and announce the next visitor.

The guard entered a moment later. "That was the last of the visitors for today. The next visitation session will be two weeks from today." He checked his watch. "You'll be in the classroom until your normally allotted time is up, and then you can return to your rooms." He stepped out, leaving the kids alone.

"That can't be right," Minhyuk said, looking around at the other boys, who avoided his eyes (Hyungwon better than most since he was asleep). "My mom said...she said she would..." He swallowed. "What about your parents?" he asked Kihyun, although he already knew the answer.

Kihyun raised an eyebrow. "I wouldn't go talk to my mom even if she  _did_  show up."

Minhyuk swiveled in his chair, his eyes wildly hunting the only other person in the room who had not been called. "And...and-"

Wonho shrugged, looked uncomfortable as he shifted in his seat. "We aren't close," he reasoned, although he didn't really know why he'd been expecting to get a visit at all.

Minhyuk bit his lip before slumping down in his seat. Changkyun looked over with sad eyes, used to supporting his roommate through depressive cycles or when his medication wasn't working effectively, but it was hard to help when Minhyuk had gotten his hopes up and then had them crushed.

"Maybe next time, yeah?" he suggested, biting his lip because he knew how weak and halfhearted that sounded, but Changkyun had no other words of consolation.

"Yeah, maybe," Minhyuk said, laying his head on his arms. "Or maybe not."


	29. Chapter 29

"He's dead asleep," Kihyun said, poking Hyungwon, who remained still. Kihyun looked over at Wonho with expectant eyes, crossing his arms over his chest as if to say  _don't look at me_. "You're going to have to carry him back."

"Okay," Wonho agreed easily. He didn't have access to any weights here, and lugging Hyungwon around was a good enough substitute, although Wonho was used to benching more than Hyungwon's entire body weight. He pulled Hyungwon's chair back before sliding an arm under his knees and leaning the boy against his chest as he slipped his other arm behind Wonho's back. Hyungwon's limbs swayed limply like those of a rag doll.

Kihyun muttered something about a  _showoff_ and  _muscle pig_  before exiting the classroom in a huff, Wonho following a few steps behind. With the exception of the unconscious boy in his arms, their room hadn't received any visitors. Jooheon and Shownu had both gotten to see their families, and Changkyun got to see his mom. If he ran the math, that meant that Jooheon's room had had 100% visitation, and Changkyun's room had had 50% (as Minhyuk had not been visited), whereas their room had only received roughly 33%.

Wonho wasn't quite sure on the math since it wasn't his strong suit, but he thought it rather odd that they'd put the forgotten kids in the same room. Even Hyungwon had looked shocked that his parents had come. Wonho wondered if they'd been grouped together for a reason.

Kihyun collapsed on his bed, groaning melodramatically as Wonho set Hyungwon down. "I'm exhausted," Kihyun proclaimed, and Wonho raised his eyebrow.

"Why? You didn't do anything today," Wonho said. It was true; all they'd done was sit in a classroom. Very low activity.

"Well I worked too hard at doing nothing and now I'm tired from all that effort."

***

In the other room, Changkyun was sitting with Minhyuk on his bed, rubbing his back. "Hey, I know you're upset...and you're always trying to cheer up everyone else when they're having a hard time...but you gotta take care of yourself, you know?"

Minhyuk was quiet, his frown making a permanent residence on his face.

"Why do you even care so much if she comes?" Changkyun asked before looking down, feeling guilty for having suggested it, but he couldn't stop now. "She's addicted to drugs, and when you lived with her, she stole your money to feed her addiction. She didn't take care of you. She barely took care of herself. You're honestly better off without her, Minhyuk. So...why...why do you want to see her so badly?"

Minhyuk looked up with tears in his eyes. "Yeah, she's a mess," he choked out. "But she's still- she's still my  _mom_."

Changkyun nodded slowly before pulling Minhyuk in for a side hug, leaning his head on Minhyuk's shoulder.

***

"I said I'm fine," Jooheon snapped, glaring at Shownu from across the room.

"I didn't say anything," Shownu said, his voice even and soft. Despite being upset with Jooheon the previous day, he was calm now, seeming to have forgotten the whole incident.

"Yeah but you keep looking at me like that."

"Like what?"

"Like you want me to cry or something," Jooheon said, scowling as he massaged his knuckles like he wanted to punch something. "My dad died. Big frickin deal. Whoop de doo."

"It  _is_  a big deal."

"Maybe to someone who cares." Jooheon frowned, anger fading into sadness. "I just- it's good that he's gone. Everything can be okay now."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that everything is going to be easier with him gone," Jooheon said without flinching or even looking guilty. "We got into a lot of fights. We made my mom cry at night sometimes. But it was all just physical, you know? I...I know that he loved me. I think. And I think I loved him too. But it was hard being around him because it was so easy to just fall back into the usual pattern. And..." Jooheon exhaled. "Now that he's gone, I won't have to defend myself from him. It'll just be me and my mom. She's good to me. We can be happy together."

"But what about the anger?" Shownu asked. He didn't want to push Jooheon, but he knew that Jooheon needed someone to talk to, and sometimes he needed someone to prod the words out from him.

"The anger?" Jooheon laughed at the phrase.

"The anger that's inside you," Shownu said. "He was the cause of it, right? Your dad. And now you've got all this anger with nowhere to go."

Jooheon was quiet as though he'd only just considered Shownu's words. "I...it'll go away. It'll go away cause he's gone and-"

"Jooheon, maybe it isn't going to go away."

Jooheon looked up angrily, his eyes wet with tears he didn't want to shed. "It has to go away! Because I'm sick of- I'm sick of feeling like this all the time!"

"Like what?"

"Like I just want to hurt things! I'm tired of hurting people!" Jooheon folded his hands in front of his mouth like little kids do when their hands are cold. "I'm tired of hurting my friends."

Shownu nodded along with Jooheon's words. "I'm not saying you can't get better, Jooheon," he said softly. He had to be careful with Jooheon, had to know when to push him and when to pull back. "I know you can get better. I just think it's unhealthy for you to pin all of your anger on your dad and just assume that it'll disappear with him because it might not. It might just be a part of who you are."

Jooheon's laugh bounced off the walls, high-pitched and cynical and desperate and hopeless. "They said that you just gotta be yourself, that it's okay to be messed-up or different or wrong, but then nobody wants to help you, no one wants to reach out to you, no one wants to know you." His laughter trailed off with a ragged inhale. "I'm sick of this," he admitted, his voice quiet and needy. "I hate this. I just want..."

"What do you want, Jooheon?"

"I want to feel at peace. I want to know what that feels like. To just be content. Screw happiness. I don't need it. I just...want a moment where I don't want to punch or kill or destroy something. Where I can just sit and let things be. Where I don't have to be part of the problem or part of the solution or part of anything."

"You know how you can get there," Shownu said carefully. This wasn't a time to push.

Jooheon sighed, laying back on his bed and staring at the ceiling as though he were scoping out the stars beyond it. "I didn't...want to have to. I wanted to beat this on my own."

"We all need a little help sometimes." Shownu bit his lip. "Dr. Irving won't ever force you to take the pills, Jooheon. He wants it to be your decision because only you can take care of yourself. And I know you think relying on pills means that you're weak, but that's not it at all, Jooheon. The pills are there to help you."

Jooheon snorted lightly, tears still shining in his eyes. "That's great coming from you."

Shownu was quiet. "Taking the pills or not taking the pills is your choice, Jooheon. And they might help you find the peace you've been looking for."

Jooheon was quiet before he rolled over to face the wall, and that was the end of their conversation for the night.


	30. Chapter 30

Things changed after that night.

Jooheon grew quieter, more restrained. Calmer. He hadn't climbed on top of any tables or yelled at anyone or punched anyone.

It was almost alarming.

It was like a different kid altogether.

As for Wonho, something strange occurred in that nothing occurred at all. He'd been Nathan for the past week, and on Monday, he was still Nathan.

"It usually only lasts a week," Kihyun told Hyungwon with a confused but disinterested shrug. "Maybe this is who he really is. We'll never really know."

Hyungwon shrugged back, but he didn't feel like the boy who consistently caught and carried him when he collapsed looked like a Nathan.

Hyungwon, in the meantime, had survived another evaluation, feeling less anxious about this one since he knew what to expect, even though it still made him extremely uncomfortable. He spent the week with Kihyun and Wonho (or was he really Nathan?). He was most comfortable around them since they roomed together, but also since they seemed the most...real...out of the group.

Changkyun had always been a bit fidgety, and while Hyungwon appreciated Minhyuk's presence, he sensed that the other boy had a hard time being honest. He sensed a darkness in Minhyuk, a darkness that Minhyuk pretended didn't exist, and while Hyungwon felt how positive and bright Minhyuk could be, his friendly aura was perpetually stained with the feeling of deception.

As for Shownu, Hyungwon had never really understood him. The calmest and most accepting of the group, he seemed to be friendly with everyone without really getting close to anyone. He was nice enough to like but not memorable to remember with his half-smiles and soft laughter and quiet assurances. There were days that Hyungwon would lay in bed and try to remember if he'd talked with Shownu at all. He had a hard time recalling.

And so the week, Hyungwon's third in the institution, drifted by as usual. They were permitted to eat breakfast in the cafeteria once more after their probationary status had been revoked, so they trudged down to the common area each morning and took their seats around the table with a large M in the middle.

"Morning, Skeleton," Jooheon said with a nod, acknowledging Hyungwon's presence as he approached the table from behind Kihyun. Even though he knew the way now, he still let Kihyun lead because the smaller boy seemed to walk with a confidence that Hyungwon knew he still didn't possess, even after two weeks under his belt, and Wonho preferred to walk behind or next to Hyungwon in case he needed to make a quick catch if the boy went limp.

"G'morning, Jooheon," Hyungwon said. He was too tired to manage a smile, but he tipped his head forward and down slightly, dragging a hand through his bangs as he sat down.

Kihyun sat to his right and picked up the fork, prodding the tip of his index finger with one of the tines to test the sharpness. It seemed as though the calmer Jooheon became, the more agitated Kihyun became, the more frustrated he became with the cameras, with the personnel. Even now, instead of eating his breakfast, his eyes were narrowed in on the closest ward guard, his lips pulled back slightly to reveal his sharper teeth.

Hyungwon set a hand on his arm, feeling the forearm muscle tense beneath his palm. "You should eat something," he suggested softly. "Or you'll be hungry later."

Kihyun stared at the guard for several more seconds before exhaling sharply and looking down at his tray, beginning to eat forkful by forkful but looking up at guards and cameras in between.

It made Hyungwon sad. He knew that they weren't defined by their conditions, but it upset him to see Kihyun's illness taking control of him and spiraling away. He'd seemed better lately, thoughtful at times and even someone Hyungwon had come to rely on and care about, but now...

In this state, Kihyun didn't have room to care about anyone but himself and the nonexistent threats to his own safety.

Hyungwon wondered if that was what would happen to them all sooner or later, that they'd just wear themselves down, their conditions eating at them until they were just stumbling along without any knowledge of who they were or how they'd gotten there.

Hyungwon frowned as he realized that Kihyun had stopped eating again, his left hand poised by the tray, and Hyungwon got a good look at the scar running across his flesh. It was thick and white, running horizontally across, and it looked to have healed over.

"How did you get that?" Hyungwon asked, pointing at Kihyun's scar without touching him. He'd probably made a mistake of touching his arm earlier, but he'd thought that Kihyun had needed a physical touch to bring him back to focus. Now, however, he didn't want overstep his boundaries. Kihyun had respected Hyungwon's, making it clear just how important boundaries were, and Hyungwon didn't want to betray that trust. "If you don't mind me asking," he added after a brief moment of hesitation.

Kihyun didn't take his eyes off the ward guard. "My mom. Cut my hand open. Kitchen knife." Before Hyungwon could ask why (not that he was going to), Kihyun continued, "Said I look too much like my dad."

Hyungwon was quiet. He didn't want to ask any questions. Anything that Kihyun wanted to say, he'd say. And anything that he didn't want to say, Hyungwon shouldn't ask about.

"He left her. Got her pregnant and left. Her family disowned her. She raised me by herself. Was hoping I'd have her eyes at least but she wasn't a lucky woman." He paused, swallowing, and for a moment, Hyungwon saw the Kihyun he knew, the one who was a little bit vulnerable and a lot a bit bitter, but then his face became blank once more, even though he wasn't looking over at Hyungwon. "I started looking like him more and more as I grew up. She just couldn't take it any more. Said it was all his fault. Or my fault. She was screaming at me. Crazy. Riled up. She wasn't making sense. To herself, I guess she was." Kihyun opened his mouth, paused, his eyes turning foggy as he remembered. "I tried to calm her down, walked up to her slowly, told her to stop yelling and just breathe and then she-" Kihyun's eyes flashed as he scowled. "She slashed at me, her son. Who the frick does that? Who just...who hurts their son?"

There was silence at the table for a moment.

Then, "Shit, man, that's too heavy for the breakfast table," Changkyun said.


	31. Chapter 31

Jooheon left. It wasn't sudden, and they all knew it was coming in one way or another, but there was a disparity between knowing that it might happen and having it actually occur. In order to complete the program, he needed to pass two consecutive evaluations, and after he started taking his prescribed medication, he managed to pass both, one and then the other two weeks later, and within a month, his bed was empty, his desk unused.

Everybody missed Jooheon but didn't want to say it for various reasons. Kihyun felt abandoned to a degree; he grew more bitter, more unstable, but to acknowledge Jooheon's absence was to acknowledge  his own spiraling condition, so Kihyun said nothing on the matter. Changkyun's anxiety perked up because unlike many of the other patients, he had a family that he wanted to go home to, but that was impossible for him in his current state. Minhyuk's solution to Jooheon's absence was to simply ignore it, driving himself even harder to be the light in the darkness for them, exacerbating his own condition by exhausting himself by trying to emit too much energy. Wonho didn't know Jooheon well enough to miss him, necessarily, but he missed the camaraderie that the seven had built up. Six just felt...empty.

For Shownu, who had been in the program the longest, the mental institution had become a home of sorts to him, M-wing his family, not to mention that Jooheon had been his roommate. He internalized his own feelings on the matter.

As for Hyungwon...there was no one to greet him with a "Hey Skeleton," when he sat down at the breakfast table. Even if Jooheon hadn't liked him at first, he'd acknowledged Hyungwon's presence, and when they'd gradually become friends, Hyungwon had found himself caring for the turbulent boy who burned with the intensity of a dying star, the boy whose anger could light a thousand cities.

But he'd left, and Hyungwon had stayed, and that was that.

***

The classroom was charged with a negative, defeated energy. Everybody looked tired since they hadn't been sleeping well, and Hyungwon knew he was close to passing out.

The teacher was late, and maybe that's why it happened. Maybe that was the incident that made Minhyuk do what he did.

Without getting out of his seat, he propped his head on his hand, elbow planted on the desk. "I think I'm going home, too," he said. Nobody said anything. Maybe he took that as encouragement. "I have to get back and take care of my mom. You know how she is. She...she needs me."

Hyungwon, who had been resting his head on the desk, arms folded beneath him, turned his head to look the other way, away from Minhyuk, so Minhyuk wouldn't see the sadness and anger fighting each other in his eyes.

When Hyungwon had first arrived at the institution, he hadn't been accepted. But he'd earned it eventually, and he'd come to feel accepted here.

Only now, everyone else seemed to think that they didn't need him as much as he needed them.

They were all leaving him.

The teacher entered the classroom before anyone could say anything, and a month later, there was another empty desk in the classroom.


	32. Chapter 32

With both Jooheon and Minhyuk gone, Changkyun was moved into Shownu's room, and the extra room was cleaned of any leftover belongings and permanently locked.

The breakfast table was quiet, broken only by the whine of plastic against plastic as Kihyun grated his knife against the breakfast tray. Everybody was looking down at their own tray, not knowing what to say to break the quiet. Jooheon had always been good at talking, even if most of what he said was offensive or with the intention of riling someone up. And Minhyuk's inane babbling and rambling had been comforting in a way. Normal. Like they had just been seven boys in the high school lunch room gossiping about high school drama.

"So," Wonho spoke up after a moment. Changkyun looked up, somewhat curious but also resigned into silence. Wonho scanned their faces, passing quickly over Kihyun's and Shownu's when they gave no response, and landing on Hyungwon, who was staring down at his tray, his fork limp in his fingers. "Hey," Wonho said softly, putting a hand on Hyungwon's shoulder. "Are you all right? You don't look great," he said, eyeing the dark marks smudging the valleys underneath Hyungwon's eyes.

Hyungwon didn't respond, his eyes somewhat unfocused.

"Hyungwon?" Wonho scooted a bit closer, worried that Hyungwon would go unconscious any second now and fall backward, hitting his head on the ground. So far, despite the first time that had caught him off guard, Wonho had managed to avoid letting Hyungwon hit his head, but he knew how dangerous a head injury could be. Wonho swallowed, taking it upon himself to provide conversation for the table. "Guest visits are coming up soon. That's good, isn't it? To see your mom or dad."

Changkyun's lips tightened as though he wasn't sure whether to be happy or angry at himself for being happy. Shownu just smiled, a small smile, like he was content, and Kihyun twitched, shaking slightly.

"Don't let her near me," he hissed, head snapping up, and Wonho swallowed, realizing that he'd accidentally activated one of Kihyun's triggers. "Go away, I want everyone to go away, go away go away go  _away_ -"

Kihyun began ranting, slamming his hands on the table and muttering "goawaygoawaygoaway" under his breath, the letters and words blurring together as students from other tables started turning to look.

"Kihyun," Hyungwon said, his eyes refocusing temporarily as he stared with a tragic look in his eyes, like he wanted to help but knew that Kihyun wouldn't accept it anyway. "You're okay. You're safe."

"Goawaygoawaygoaway," Kihyun said, rocking back and forth in his seat, eyes crazed, arms clutching himself.

"Kihyun-" Hyungwon began, biting his lip before reaching out to put an unsteady finger on Kihyun's arm, trying to calm him down, but his actions backfired.

Kihyun immediately shot away from Hyungwon's touch, glaring at him. "GOAWAYGOAWAYGOAWAY!"

Hyungwon's eyes were mirrors reflecting the pain hidden in Kihyun's eyes before they shattered.

"GOAWAYGOAWAYGOAWAY!" Kihyun screamed, rocking back and forth once more, tears streaming from his eyes without his knowing as he clutched his hands over his ears, screaming the words over and over, and all Wonho could do was hold Hyungwon back from trying to reach Kihyun because he knew that if he did, Hyungwon would just get hurt.

The ward guards finally reached Kihyun and injected a sedative into his neck, waiting for his screams to die down and his eyes to flutter before they carefully removed him from his seat, carrying him to a stretcher and carting him away.

Hyungwon watched with horrified eyes.

He had done this.

He had known how important boundaries were, and...and he had crossed a line, the line separating Kihyun from insanity.

Kihyun had had a mental breakdown, and Hyungwon was partially to blame.

He'd never wanted to lose consciousness more, but it didn't come to him.


	33. Chapter 33

"It's not your fault," Wonho said, not for the first time, since they'd returned to their room. Hyungwon was just lying in his bed, looking too thin and frail to hold the mattress down, staring up at the ceiling listlessly. "He's going to be okay," Wonho said, another empty phrase he'd used multiple times to no avail. "He hasn't been doing well lately. It was bound to happen at some point. And maybe they can help him-"

"I  _hurt_  him," Hyungwon said, or at least, the sound came from Hyungwon's parted lips, but he didn't appear to stir.

"You didn't hurt him," Wonho said, blinking and sitting up in his bed, looking over at his roommate with concern. Hyungwon was one of the most delicate out of the group in terms of sensitivity, and Wonho knew that they all needed to treat him carefully or else he'd end up like Kihyun and just break entirely. "You were trying to help."

"But I hurt him," Hyungwon repeated, tears slowly leaking out of his eyes. "I thought that because we were friends, that I could make a difference, but in the end..." He put his hands over his eyes, and Wonho didn't know whether it was to block out the empty ceiling yawning back at him or to block out the light. "In the end, it doesn't matter what we want or who we care about," Hyungwon mumbled. "We can't control anything. Not ourselves. Not our brains."

"Hyungwon-" Wonho began, moving over to the other's bed, and Hyungwon removed his hands, staring up at Wonho with desperation shining in his wet eyes as he grabbed Wonho's wrists.

"I don't want that to happen to me." Hyungwon swallowed, his tone soft and urgent and raw. "I don't want to become like that. Like something else."

"You..." Wonho swallowed, licking his bottom lip. "You won't, Wonnie."

It was as though he'd flipped a switch in the thinner boy. Hyungwon let go of Wonho abruptly, his eyes darkening. "You're lying, you're lying and I know you're lying. Only Kihyun calls me that. Only Kihyun-" Uttering the missing boy's name seemed to remind Hyungwon of the situation, and he cut off, staring at a wall.

He'd been doing that a lot lately, and it was really starting to worry Wonho. It seemed as though every day, there was a little bit less of Hyungwon. Physically. Emotionally. Mentally.

What happened when there was nothing left?

***

Kihyun was returned to them the following night, looking pale but otherwise calmer than they'd seen him in weeks.

"Miss me?" he asked with a smug grin, but Wonho could see how tired he was.

Hyungwon didn't even look over.

"Hey," Kihyun said, frowning. "Wonnie. You're going to ignore me now?"

Hyungwon gritted his teeth.

Kihyun went over to stand by Hyungwon's bed, casting a shadow down on him as Kihyun crossed his arms. "What, you're pissed at me for snapping and scaring you?"

Hyungwon avoided Kihyun's eyes.

Kihyun sighed before parting Hyungwon's bangs with two of his fingers, being careful not to touch his face. "I'm sorry, okay? I wasn't me for a second there." Kihyun paused to look over at Wonho, who had been waiting nearby expectantly, with a glare. "What, you want an apology too?"

Wonho stepped back and took a seat on his bed as Kihyun turned back to Hyungwon.

"I'm sorry, okay? For real."

Hyungwon was quiet, having closed his eyes as Kihyun had played with his hair, but now he opened them. "What's real anymore, Kihyun?"

His voice sounded so weak, so confused, and Wonho had to hold himself down to the bed and remind himself that maybe Hyungwon needed Kihyun right now and not him.

"Hell if I know," Kihyun muttered back, and Hyungwon's eyes fluttered back shut as Kihyun ran his fingers through his hair. "Get some rest, Hyungwon. You look like you haven't slept in a week."

"If I go to sleep, will you be gone when I wake up?" Hyungwon asked, his voice thin and needy, and Wonho realized that Hyungwon was starting to expect that, for them to leave like Jooheon and Minhyuk, two boys he had formed close friendships with, who had traded their relationship for a life of sanity, be it forced or otherwise.

"Go to sleep," Kihyun said instead, and Hyungwon just nodded slightly. Kihyun played with his hair until Hyungwon had stilled and his breathing had evened before pulling back and sitting on his own bed, staring across at Wonho, who watched him closely. "I might be leaving soon."


	34. Chapter 34

"I might be leaving soon," Kihyun said, and Wonho flinched.

"No, you can't-" Wonho swallowed. "You can't do that to us. Not now. Not so soon after Minhyuk."

Kihyun snorted. "You don't care if I leave. You wanted to say that I can't do that to Wonnie." Kihyun grew quiet and cast a glance over at their sleeping roommate. "He'll get over it."

"No he won't," Wonho said, his anger evident in both his voice and in the veins tensing in his neck. "He still can't get over the others, and they...they didn't know him like you know him."

"You mean they never saw him in his darkest hour," Kihyun rephrased, and Wonho hesitated before nodding.

"Hyungwon needs you," Wonho insisted, biting his lip. "I'm not kidding, Kihyun. He's falling apart."

Kihyun was quiet for a moment before laying down in his bed, arms folded behind his head. "We're all falling apart."

"Are you just going to let him break down like that?" Wonho's eyebrows furrowed with anxiety.

Kihyun pursed his lips. "They offered me a place in A-wing, Wonho."

Wonho swallowed back his initial response,  _My name is Nathan, not Wonho,_  and let him continue.

"Do you know what that means?" Kihyun's lips parted as he stared at the ceiling. "No cameras. Nobody watching me all the time. Nobody spying on me. I could finally relax." Kihyun looked over at Wonho with hard, defensive eyes. "If I don't go,  _I'm_  going to be the one falling apart. I can't- I can't let this just slip away from me, okay? I need this."

"What about us?" Wonho asked, his voice sounding hollow to his own ears. He was having difficulty in processing that Kihyun, the boy who had held Hyungwon during his panic attack, was going to leave them all behind for his own selfish reason. Even if it was a decent selfish reason.

"This has never been about  _us_ ," Kihyun said, sitting up and crossing his arms. "This place isn't about making friends, Wonho-"

"Nathan."

"Fine, Nathan. You don't come here because you're lonely. You come here because you're screwed up and either you don't want to be or someone else doesn't want you to be. This has never been about  _us_. It's everyone for themselves here. You look out for you, and I'll look out for me."

"Then who's going to look out for Hyungwon?" Wonho asked. He was angry, angry that someone who had seen through their vulnerabilities could throw them away just like that. "He can't look after himself, Kihyun. You know that. The narcolepsy, yeah, but the panic attacks too. He needs help. He needs  _your_  help."

"Well maybe I need help too," Kihyun muttered, turning over on his side so his back faced Wonho.

Wonho hesitated to respond, sensing that the conversation was pretty much over any way. He understood that Kihyun was doing what was best for his mental health, but it didn't stop Wonho from feeling hurt.

He knew it wouldn't stop Hyungwon from feeling hurt, either.


	35. Chapter 35

"It's been three and a half months, Hyungwon," she said, her voice coming through the telephone hanging loosely in Hyungwon's hand. "We thought that you would be done with this by now."

 _I thought you would stop coming by now,_  Hyungwon thought but didn't say anything. He didn't feel like saying much of anything at all these days. He just stared back across the glass at a face that grew less familiar each day.

"You have a place in our family, and there's a general expectation that you return to fill it," she continued. She always had something to say. "We enrolled you in this program to fix whatever the problem was, but you've shown no signs of progress. You've failed every weekly evaluation. And frankly, judging from your appearance and lack of respect, you're only getting worse, not better."

But Hyungwon wasn't listening to her cruel opinions. Instead, he was thinking about Jooheon.

 _Hey, Skeleton. You look like shit today. Did you sleep at all?_  His seemingly harsh, rough way of caring.

He thought about Minhyuk.  _Hyungwon! Did I ever show you my birthmark? Because I swear it moved two inches to the right last night-_  His easy friendship, an internal warmth that he carried with him in a place that provided none.

He thought about Kihyun.  _Sorry Wonnie but we're locked in for the night._  His quiet, honest comfort.

"-did you hear me, Hyungwon?"

Hyungwon blinked and stared back at the woman.

"You're a disgrace and I..."

Hyungwon slowly pulled the phone away from his ear and set it down on the ledge, not placing it back on the hook to end the call, but setting it down so he didn't have to listen anymore. He watched her mouth move from the other side of the glass, but he just stared back, watching as her lips parted and her mouth shaped different syllables all with the purpose of wounding him.

"You can hang up the phone if you want to end the visitation session," the ward guard said from behind him, and Hyungwon turned his head to meet the man's eyes.

"You said as long as I don't hang up, I don't have to go back, right?" Hyungwon asked. He didn't want to return to the half-empty classroom. And he didn't really care what his mother had to say anymore. He couldn't hear her words anyway.

The guard hesitated. "Well, yes, you have thirty minutes from the time you start the call until the time you end it, but-"

"Then I'll take my thirty minutes," Hyungwon said, turning back to face the glass. His mother glared back at him, his father's mouth puckered uncomfortably, but Hyungwon just pushed his chair back, put his shoes up on the counter, and closed his eyes. He could hear the buzzing of the phone very distantly, and then after a few minutes, the buzzing stopped. He opened his eyes to see that his parents had left the other room.

"You have eleven minutes left," the guard said. "Are you sure you don't want to go back now-"

Hyungwon closed his eyes for eleven minutes, and when the eleven minutes were over, he picked up the phone with delicate fingers and placed it back on the hook.


	36. Chapter 36

"How'd your visit with your mom go?" Wonho asked Changkyun, who shifted his eyes from left to right above Wonho's head.

"Uh, it, it went fine," he said before looking down at his desk.

"Oh, okay," Wonho said, blinking, but the opening of the classroom door saved him from attempting to make any more small talk.

Hyungwon entered the room, looking more tired than when he'd left. Wonho's shoulders tensed instinctively.

"How'd it go?" he asked after a moment before checking the clock. "You guys talked for a long time. They missed you a lot, huh?"

Hyungwon was quiet for a moment. Then, "No, I don't think so."

Wonho blinked. "Then...what took you so long?"

Hyungwon sat down at his desk, his eyes shifting over to the empty desk beside him that would always, in his mind, be Minhyuk's. "I don't know." Hyungwon seemed to sink down into his seat, become smaller.

"Are you feeling all right?" Wonho asked. He didn't want to pressure Hyungwon, but he knew that neither Shownu or Changkyun were close with Hyungwon, and he was the only person left who really cared about the older boy.

Hyungwon didn't respond, just laid his head on his desk.

***

When it was time to leave class for the day, everyone stood up except for Hyungwon, who remained sprawled across his desk. Wonho went over and gently shook him before sighing and picking him up. It scared him how easily he was able to lift Hyungwon, and it wasn't because he'd been getting stronger.

He laid Hyungwon on his bed before starting an exercise routine, trying to focus on sweating out a few calories rather than the issue at hand.

He felt like Hyungwon was his responsibility, but was that true? Kihyun seemed to think not.

A rustling of sheets some time later drew his focus, and he paused in the middle of a set of push-ups to glance over at Hyungwon's bed. Hyungwon was just starting to sit up and rub his eyes, his uniform hanging loosely on his thinning frame.

"Want to join me for a workout?" Wonho asked despite having already done most of the exercises that he could.

Hyungwon didn't say anything but got out of bed after a moment, sitting down on the ground next to Wonho, who had sat up with his back to his bed frame.

"What do you want to start with? Maybe some sit-ups?"

Hyungwon shrugged, and Wonho got in sit-up position, watching as Hyungwon slowly mimicked him.

"All right, let's go for tw- fifteen," Wonho said with a smile. He usually did sets in twenties, but he didn't want to put too much strain on Hyungwon's more slender form.

Hyungwon didn't speak but did the workout next to Wonho, shaking a bit from eleven onward, but Wonho let them take a short break before speaking up.

"All right, let's do ten push-ups," he suggested, and once again, Hyungwon copied his form and waited for Wonho to start. Wonho noted with worry how Hyungwon's arms were shaking right at the beginning, his body only trembling harder with each push-up.

Wonho dropped on the ground after eight, and Hyungwon paused.

"I can only do eight today," Wonho said, feigning exhaustion. He could honestly do twenty, thirty, forty more, but he didn't want to see Hyungwon hurt himself. Better to pretend that it was his limitation holding them back then let Hyungwon have his pride hurt.

Hyungwon slowly shifted his position so he was sitting with his back against Wonho's bed, and Wonho joined him.

"What's going on in your head right now?" Wonho asked.

There was a long moment of silence in which Wonho assumed that Hyungwon wasn't going to answer, but then his spoke up, his voice soft and rough. "I'm scared."

"Of what?" Wonho asked, trying not to sound invasive.

"Of being alone."

"Why?"

"Because I can't tell what's real and what's fake when I'm by myself."


	37. Chapter 37

"How do you think you're doing?" Dr. Irving asked, his eyebrows knitted across his forehead.

Hyungwon, fully dressed, stared back at him. He and Dr. Irving had worked out a deal where as long as Hyungwon cooperated and was fully honest during the physical examination, he could put back his clothes for the psych examination if it made him more comfortable. It did, and it made Hyungwon like Dr. Irving a bit more.

"Okay," Hyungwon answered. It was his usual answer. He didn't want to lie to Dr. Irving, and it wasn't that it was necessarily a lie, but...It was too broad of a question to be answered any way but simply.

Dr. Irving's lips twitched downward. "I heard that you refused to cooperate during your visitation session?" He consulted his clipboard for a moment. "That you stopped talking to your parents and let the time run out before hanging up the phone? Is that correct?"

Hyungwon nodded. He didn't say anything because he knew that Dr. Irving would ask whatever questions he needed to in order to get full answers.

"Why did you do that, Hyungwon?" Dr. Irving paused and clarified. "Why did you ignore your parents when they came to visit you?" He looked down at his clipboard for a moment. "It looks like they've been coming every week. That's nice, isn't it? But you've never ignored them before. So why this time?"

Hyungwon was quiet for a moment. That was another reason he liked Dr. Irving. Dr. Irving gave him time to think instead of just forcing an answer out of him. "It's not nice," he said, referring to the rhetorical question. "'They're not nice people."

Dr. Irving nodded slowly. "But then why didn't you refuse to speak with them earlier?" He looked distressed. "Hyungwon, you do know that you don't have to do anything you're not comfortable with, correct?" He paused, grimacing. "Well, I know you're uncomfortable with the evaluations, but those are necessary to assess how you're doing mentally and physically. But everything else - your medication, your classes, and yes, your visitation sessions - you have the right to choose whether or not you feel safe and comfortable with those actions or events."

"Classes are optional?" Hyungwon asked. He often got distracted during their talks, but Dr. Irving never got frustrated with him, just let Hyungwon steer the conversation anywhere he wanted as he followed along patiently.

"Classes are optional," Dr. Irving confirmed with a single nod of his head followed by slightly smaller nods, echoes of the first. "But we highly encourage everyone to attend because isolation can be damaging physically and in terms of your psychological state. Interacting with other patients here is important for you and everyone else to keep building and reinforcing positive social connections. Cutting yourself off from that could hurt you in a lot of ways. That said, we can't truly force you to go if you feel in some way unsafe or extremely uncomfortable, but there may be other consequences if you choose not to attend."

Hyungwon just nodded, and Dr. Irving took his silence as permission to proceed with his second question, not that the first had been answered in any great depth, but Hyungwon knew that they'd probably come back to it next week.

"Now, Hyungwon, can you tell me about the phone? Why didn't you just hang up? Why wait the full thirty minutes?"

Hyungwon thought for a moment. "All my friends are leaving me," he said, his voice soft. "I don't like the classroom. It's not that big, but it seems a lot bigger now with so many people gone."

"You're talking about Jooheon, Minhyuk, and Kihyun, correct?"

Hyungwon nodded, playing with his fingers. He wondered if they held their own memories. He'd been a pianist before enrolling in the program, but he hadn't touched a piano in months. He wondered if he still remembered.

"Do you want to talk about them, Hyungwon?"

Hyungwon blinked as he considered. "No," he said at last. "I don't want to talk about them."

"All right, we don't have to talk about them, but can you just tell me how you feel about them right now?"

Hyungwon inhaled deeply, staring downward as he tried to put words to the tension in his body. "Angry. Sad."

"But no jealousy?" Dr. Irving noted with interest, scrawling something down on his clipboard.

"Why would I be jealous?" Hyungwon asked, looking up, and Dr. Irving pursed his lips.

"Not everyone is the same, and I'm not saying that any one response is normal or expected, but some patients in your position would be jealous of other patients that were released."

Hyungwon twitched.

"Do you want to stay here forever, Hyungwon?"

Hyungwon didn't respond.

Dr. Irving frowned, his eyes crinkling at the edges with worry. "Or is it that you just don't want to be somewhere else?"

Hyungwon looked up. "Can't I go yet? Isn't it time?"

Dr. Irving sighed, taking half a step back. He always hit a point in his examinations with Hyungwon in which Hyungwon stopped cooperating and instead began putting up walls instead of answering Dr. Irving's questions. The problem was that any issue that made Hyungwon uncomfortable was likely an issue that Dr. Irving needed to delve into with him to help him overcome it.

"Just one more question, Hyungwon," Dr. Irving said. One day he'd break down the walls, but not today. "Have you still been having the dreams?"

Hyungwon's lips tightened, and Dr. Irving could tell that he didn't want to answer, but he knew that Hyungwon would because he wanted to leave early.

"Yes. Most nights. More since K-" Hyungwon shut his mouth and frowned, stubborn lines outlining his locked lips.

"More since Yoo Kihyun left the program?" Dr. Irving asked, leaning forward slightly as he sensed a breakthrough coming.

"You said one question. I answered it," Hyungwon said, eyes flicking toward the door. "I'm done for today. No more questions."

Dr. Irving sighed, trying not to feel frustrated as he collected his papers and headed toward the door. "Thank you, Hyungwon. I'll meet with you in a week."

"Okay," Hyungwon said.

And, as usual, as Dr. Irving exited the room, he looked down at his clipboard in disappointment as he checked the box next to  _failed evaluation_.


	38. Chapter 38

Dr. Irving took a moment to compose himself before stepping into the next room after a polite knock on the door. "How are we doing today, Shownu?" he asked with a genuine smile on his face. Of all the students in M-wing, Shownu had been there the longest, and Dr. Irving appreciated his soft, kind demeanor, unusual in a boy his age.

"I'm doing well, thank you, Doctor," Shownu said, smiling back. "How are you doing, Dr. Irving?"

Dr. Irving smiled without bothering to hide the fatigue in his eyes. "A little tired, but that's to be expected," he said with a good-natured chuckle as he began the physical examination. There wasn't much to examine in that Shownu was a well-developed boy in near perfect physical health. "Are you experiencing any new pains that I am unaware of?" he asked, as was routine, but Shownu shook his head.

"I feel fine, Doctor."

Dr. Irving nodded. "Good to hear. Now. Shownu, if you don't mind, I'd like to discuss a few questions with you concerning what we talked about last week."

Shownu nodded.

"So, the medication - are you still taking it?" Dr. Irving asked, and Shownu nodded. Dr. Irving smiled in relief. "And it's working as expected? Any side effects?"

Shownu shook his head, a small smile on his face. "I think it's working well. I was silly to wait so long to take it. I'm glad I started."

Dr. Irving smiled gently, resisting the urge to beam at one of his favorite patients. "You know how important it is to me and the staff that you only proceed with your treatment at your own pace. Even if you took longer than others to move onto the medication option, I hope you'll find it to work for your needs."

Shownu nodded, and Dr. Irving talked with him for a few more minutes about how the medication was affecting him and how often he was taking it before standing up. "You've passed this evaluation and your previous one, so I'm going to inform you just so you're aware that you're free to remove yourself from the program with your parents' consent at any time. That said, you're welcome to stay and continue monitored treatment, but if you're looking to move on to the next phase of your recovery by going into an uncontrolled environment and seeing how you do, that's certainly an option for you, and I encourage you to discuss it with your parents when they next visit you."

Shownu smiled. "I'll be sure to talk to them about it. Thank you again, Dr. Irving."

Dr. Irving nodded as he stepped toward the door, drawing the curtain so Shownu would have privacy when he changed. "I've really enjoyed working with you, Shownu. I'm glad to see that you're progressing so much."

Shownu just smiled as Dr. Irving left.

He wasn't taking his pills. He'd never started. Instead, he pretended to take them so the cameras could verify. He would shake out a pill into his hand, put his hand up to his mouth, and pretend to swallow. As he put his medication back in its spot, he slipped the pill back in. Then, when he talked with Dr. Irving, he lied.

It was as simple as that.

He wouldn't take the pills, not now, not ever.

If he did, it would be murder.


	39. Chapter 39

A week went by without incident.

Then...

***

Wonho woke up. Looked around. Looked down. Looked at his hands. Looked around again. Looked down again. Pulled the blanket back, stared at his legs as though affirming that they were his own, and they looked like his, but there was a weird disconnect. His legs weren't the thing that was wrong; it was everything else.

That wasn't his blanket, and this wasn't his room.

"Hey," he said, his voice falling flat. He didn't know who he was addressing, but he felt like he needed to address  _someone_.

This wasn't his room.

"Hey," he said, a bit louder, looking around, looking up at the corners of the room.

_Is that...is that a camera?_

A shuffling noise from the other side of the room startled him, and his head snapped down to watch as what had seemed like a limp pile of blankets earlier shifted, a head rising from the mattress. "Nathan?" a bleary voice, full of sleep, confusion. "What's wrong?"

"Who's Nathan?" Wonho asked, staring at the boy. "Why are you here? Where am I?"

The boy stared at him. "You're-" His voice faltered. "You... _were_  Nathan."

"Where are we? Who are you?" Wonho asked, his eyes flitting around as he drank in all the visual information in front of him. A bare room, three beds, one door. Camera in the top right corner. A boy, looked to be young, but his face was aged by weariness and knowledge he shouldn't have had. A thin shirt was slipping off one of his shoulders, exposing one of his collarbones, the other side holding on at his neck. It wasn't a provocative sight, but it seemed too vulnerable a display between strangers, and the discomfort of seeing it made Wonho turn his head away. "What's going on?" he asked, looking back up at the camera. "What is that for?"

The boy hesitated for a moment, and when Wonho looked back at him, there were too many emotions held in his eyes for Wonho to decipher even a single one. "I'm Hyungwon. You don't...you don't remember me?"

"Remember you?" Wonho frowned. "I've never met you before. Do you know why we're here? What is this place?"

The boy frowned, his lip wobbling before he teased it between his teeth. He draped his blanket over his shoulders so he was fully bundled all the way up to his neck. He looked conflicted, as though he knew something but couldn't say, and Wonho frowned, standing up and moving toward the boy.

"Hey, you know what's going on, don't you?" Wonho accused, glaring down at the boy, who was just staring blankly at a wall. "Hey," Wonho said, trying to remember the boy's name. "Hyungwon. Hey, answer me," he said, raising his voice. He was starting to feel scared, and his panic was quickly manifesting itself into anger and intimidation. He reached out to touch the boy and snap him out of whatever trance he'd fallen into, but the only displayed skin was from him neck upward, and as Wonho brushed his fingers against the boy's neck, the boy shot backward, his spine and head smacking into the wall with a harsh  _thud_  as the boy's eyes met Wonho's.

"Don't- don't touch me," he said, and the blankets covering him trembled along with his body. He brought his knees up to his chest and held them, rocking slightly in the fetal position, clenching the blanket around himself.

"Hey," Wonho said, frowning.  _What game is this kid playing? What the heck is going on?_  He reached out again, but the boy flinched and quickly changed his position so his arms were covering his head, elbows out.

"Leave me alone," the boy said, still shaking, curled up on his bed, his body language defensive.

"Look, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you, okay? Are you all right? Do you need...help?" Wonho asked, feeling somewhat guilty despite his confusion, but the boy didn't respond to any of his questions or prompts for the next except to say, "Don't touch me" several times.

A bell or alarm of some sort rang as the lock on the door disengaged, but Wonho didn't process it until two boys opened the door and peeked in.

"Hey, are you two up? We're gonna be late for breakfast," one of them said, his eyes wavering uncertainly as he leaned into the room, hanging by one arm from the door frame.

"You okay there Nathan?" the other said in a kinder tone.

"Why does everyone keep calling me that?"


	40. Chapter 40

"Why does everyone keep calling me that?" Wonho asked, his voice rising defensively. The boy who had spoken first frowned as he took in the situation, stepping fully into the room to get a better look at Hyungwon, who was still trembling and remained unresponsive.

"What did you do to him?" the boy asked, turning to look at Wonho with anger in his eyes. "What did you do?"

"I didn't do anything!" Wonho replied, taking half a step forward and gesturing vaguely to prove his point. "I woke up here - wherever  _here_  is - and he started calling me Nathan! I don't know who Nathan is or why you guys think I'm him, but I'm not, and I don't know any of you and I  _especially_ don't know why that kid is convulsing in a corner!"

"He's having some kind of a panic attack," the boy snapped, brushing past Wonho. "Probably because of something you did."

"I didn't do anything!" Wonho insisted as the second boy came up to Wonho and gestured to the hallway.

"He'll take care of Hyungwon. Maybe you should step outside to give them some space," he suggested, and Wonho frowned before nodding, mainly because he didn't want to be there any more, and he moved out into the empty hallway, surveying it twice before looking back to the boy who had come out with him.

"Who are you?" he asked, studying the boy's face.

"Shownu," he answered easily. "I live here. We all do."

"Here, where is... _what_  is 'here'?" Wonho asked, and Shownu tilted his head.

"It's basically a boarding school," he answered. "For kids with psychological conditions."

Wonho took a step back. "Psychological...what is this, an asylum?"

The boy shrugged. "That's a heavy word for it. They like to call it a 'program.'"

"Well, get me out of here," Wonho said, casting a quick glance at the room he'd just left behind. "And get me away from that kid. I swear, he thinks I tried to kill him or something."

The boy frowned for the first time, and it was only in its absence that Wonho realized the gentle warmth of his smile. "Please treat Hyungwon more kindly. I understand that you're upset-"

"Upset? I have no idea where I am and nobody's giving me any straight answers!"

"-but that's your friend and what's more, you're  _his_  friend," Shownu continued calmly as though he'd never spoken. "I get that you're confused, but we're not your enemies, and you're really going to hurt Hyungwon's feelings if you keep talking about him like that. We've already lost a lot of our friends, and we don't want to lose you too."

Wonho frowned. "Friends? I don't  _know_  you. Any of you guys. And I'm sorry if I did something to set that kid off, but I didn't know, okay?" He squares his shoulders, his eyes narrowing defensively.

"No one blames you," Shownu assured him, patting his shoulder, but Wonho squirmed under his grip.

"That other kid does. I know it. You saw how he looked at me. I didn't do anything, I swear, one second I was trying to ask him about what's going on here and the next, he was just ranting to himself."

"Changkyun has just been on edge lately. Don't worry about him, okay? It's just been a rough couple of weeks." Shownu paused before looking over at Wonho. "You should probably go see Dr. Irving. He can answer your questions, and I'm sure he'll want to talk to you." He paused. "Um...you're right, maybe we confused you for...Nathan...but...would you mind telling me your name?"

Wonho blinked, trying to figure out what angle this kid was pulling, before giving in. "I'm Shin Hoseok. I don't know who Nathan is, all right?" He paused. "I'm sorry." He threw in the apology mainly for the boy he'd left in the other room, but he didn't know why he should feel sorry about not being who they expected.

Shownu just nodded, his brow furrowed as he led Wonho down several hallways. After a few minutes of silence, he stopped outside a door and turned to face Wonho. "Just knock before you go in and ask the nurse at the desk to see Dr. Irving. He'll explain everything. Hopefully." Shownu left Wonho with a weak smile, presumably to return to the other two boys, Changkyun and Hyungwon.

Wonho turned toward the door, hesitated a moment, and knocked.


	41. Chapter 41

"I'm here to see Dr. Irving," Wonho said to the nurse at the desk, who gave him a polite smile that said she'd been busy with something before he'd walked in.

"Do you have an appointment with him?" she asked, her eyes flicking down presumably to check an online schedule.

Wonho swallowed. "No, I just...Shownu told me to ask to see him..."

The nurse hesitated before scanning her screen. "Well, he isn't currently scheduled for anything. Just take a seat, I'll run back and grab him."

"Thank you," Wonho said, bowing his head forward before turning and eyeing the chairs. He knew he'd been instructed to sit, but he was too full of nervous energy to obey her polite command. Instead, he paced back and forth, arms either behind his back or in front of him as his hands tugged at each other.

"Nathan," a warm voice said, and Wonho looked over to see a man in a white lab coat approaching him with a surprised smile. "It's not like you to drop in unscheduled. Is there something you'd like to discuss?"

"Yeah, and I'm not Nathan," Wonho said, feeling like the two went hand in hand for whatever reason. Everyone else was sure acting like they did.

Dr. Irving blinked, managing to contain most of his surprise, but he nodded and turned, gesturing for Wonho to follow him. "Come into my office. It sounds like we have a lot to talk about."

Wonho swallowed before following the older man in.

***

"You said you're Shin Hoseok?"

"Yes, I'm Shin Hoseok," Wonho repeated for the second time already, frustrated. "I don't know who Nathan is or why people think I'm him but-"

"They know that you're Shin Hoseok," Dr. Irving said, his hands patting the air to calm Wonho down.

"Well, they were all calling me Nathan today," Wonho said, his lips curling downward.

"Because you told them to call you Nathan," Dr. Irving said. "Because you yourself thought that you were Nathan."

Wonho stared at him.

Dr. Irving nodded despite Wonho having said nothing as though that had been an invitation for a medical lecture. "Hoseok, are you aware that there are certain neurological conditions that may create...let's call them separate consciousnesses...in a person?"

Wonho stared at Dr. Irving. "You're saying...like multiple personalities? Something like that?"

Dr. Irving gave a half shrug, lifting his left shoulder while bobbing his head down toward the left. "That's one condition, dissociative identity disorder. It's the one glorified in all the movies, certainly. But there are other disorders similar to it in that the individual loses touch with their 'home' self."

"And I have something like that? Is that why I'm here?" Wonho asked, his eyes widening. Up until now, everything had seemed like a mistake, one big mistake, but the feeling was starting to wear off altogether too quickly. "But I'm fine. I'm Shin Hoseok. That's who I'm supposed to be, right?"

"You're correct in that you're legally registered as Shin Hoseok, but for the past few months during your stay here, you would often create new selves - completely different personalities with different names, jobs, hobbies, backgrounds." Dr. Irving paused. "Hoseok, while you were in school, did you ever hear about something called fugue state?"

Wonho shook his head. "I don't think so. In music, yeah, but not outside of that."

Dr. Irving nodded. "I'm not really surprised. It's a condition that hasn't been thoroughly researched, mainly because it's so rare. But I believe your condition is some sort of fugue state. For you, there were multiple fugue states, but it appears that you've snapped out of that and resumed your original identity." Dr. Irving paused. "So...you remember your experiences from before your fugue states, correct? But do you recall anything from during them?"

Wonho frowned. If everything was as this doctor said, then Wonho didn't really think he  _wanted_  to remember. But then he thought about the three boys earlier, each of whom had looked at him through a friend's eyes.  _I was friends with them,_  he realized with a start.  _They were friends with the fake me. So what does that make us now?_  He thought about the boy trembling on his bed, blanket wrapped around him like a thin layer of armor. "No," he answered.

Dr. Irving nodded, thinking to himself. "That's fairly common in these sorts of cases. Which isn't to say that the memories won't come back. Some might. It's just unlikely that you'll remember the entire time you spent in fugue state."

"How long..." Wonho hesitated, but the question forced itself off his tongue. "How long was I...like that...for?"

Dr. Irving paused, looking up at him from a file of paperwork. "Around half a year." He hesitated once more before nodding to himself. "Hoseok, I think it's important to have this discussion, and we can postpone it if you like, but it's something we'll eventually have to address."

Wonho twitched slightly, not likely the sound of finality in Dr. Irving's voice. "What is it about?"

"Why this happened to you."


	42. Chapter 42

Wonho's mouth dropped open slightly, his tongue embedded to the roof of his mouth as he fought between various responses.

Dr. Irving nodded to himself before sighing. "Hoseok, do you remember the incident that triggered this all?"

Wonho frowned, suddenly feeling far less comfortable in his own skin. He couldn't recall an event that had been significant enough to affect him mentally, nor could he recall months -  _half a year_  - that some other consciousness had spent controlling his body. The thought nauseated him. "No, I...I don't remember." He paused, swallowing as he pictured his mother, his sweet, caring mother who likely hadn't seen him in six months. "I want to go home."

Dr. Irving exhaled deeply. "We'll get to your release later, Hoseok, but it's important that you understand what happened to you and why it happened."

"So why did it happen then?" Wonho asked, frustrated. He just wanted to leave. Everything about this place was just scraping at his skin, and his mind was screaming at him to get out, to leave it all behind for the life he knew, the life he felt  _comfortable_  in, where he was Shin Hoseok and Shin Hoseok was him and everything was simple and easy.

Dr. Irving looked troubled by his question and took a few moments to compose his thoughts. "Hoseok, events like this usually share a common trigger," he said slowly. "Which isn't to say every case is the same, but in most eventualities..." He licked his lips, trying to delay the inevitable. "In most eventualities, the initial stressor involves some type of sexual abuse or harassment."

Wonho blinked, the itching feeling dissolving as his limbs filled with horror. "I didn't...that never..."

"I'm sorry, Wonho, but it's my job to be honest with you as your doctor," Dr. Irving said, crossing his legs as he shifted in his chair. "A little over six months ago, you were getting your annual sports physical to be on the track team for your high school."

Wonho's head buzzed slightly with the familiar information. He remembered running every morning in the summer as school drew closer, trying to get in his best physical state. But he couldn't remember attending a sports physical.

"You were going to see your regular doctor, but he was out of town, so you had an appointment with a female doctor who had been recently hired."

If Wonho strained his mind, he could picture the outline of her, but he couldn't see her face with any degree of clarity.

"What they didn't know when they hired her was that she'd recently been fired from a position as a high school boys' swim coach for sexually harassing some of her students."

Wonho became aware of his head shaking back and forth. He knew in the back of his mind that he had to be consciously controlling his head movements, but he wasn't feeling very consciously aware at the moment. He felt like denying everything. But he couldn't, because he didn't remember anything.

"I don't know what exactly happened during your appointment with her, but it was shortly after that day that you woke up with a different consciousness. Your mother thought it was just a temporary thing at first, but when it persisted, she contacted us, and we admitted you into the program." Dr. Irving shifted once more in his chair. "We weren't informed of the exact circumstances of your stressor until later, so we believe that's what continued to create new consciousnesses. Every Sunday, we hold physical and psychological examinations, and all patients are required to undress. We think that the physical examination triggered your stressor, and when we came to that conclusion, we stopped having you undergo a full physical examination. That was around a month or two ago, and during that time, you remained under the consciousness of 'Nathan.'"

Wonho blinked, still reeling from all the information being thrown at him. "Nathan..." he repeated weakly.

"Yes," Dr. Irving said, nodding. "When we stopped your physical examinations, your mind stopped creating alternate consciousnesses to cope with the trauma, and you've lived as 'Nathan' for the past five or so weeks. That's likely why everyone has been referring to you as Nathan, because they've grown used to that consciousness, and since you haven't changed in a while, they expected it to stay."

"But I'm Shin Hoseok," Wonho said, but the words sounded fake even to his own ears. He wasn't quite sure what was true anymore. He didn't know if he wanted any more truth for today.

Dr. Irving just nodded. "Yes, you're Shin Hoseok, and you're likely to stay as Shin Hoseok for the rest of your life."

Wonho paused. "When can I...when can I go home?"

Dr. Irving hesitated, rubbing his right eyebrow as he stalled. "I'm afraid it's not quite that simple, Hoseok."


	43. Chapter 43

Wonho had to pass two evaluations to be eligible to leave the program. Dr. Irving had assured him that they wouldn't do a full physical examination, but they needed to make sure he was stable.

Which meant that he was stuck here for two weeks.

He was guided to his classroom around noon and entered the room to find three desks pulled together in the middle of the room, the three boys from the morning all sitting close to one another and eating without talking. The one boy, Hyungwon, was lying face-down on his desk, his food untouched, while the other two had taken seats on either side of him. They looked up as he entered the room.

"Pull up a desk," Shownu offered, creating a space for Wonho to join them, which he did after a moment of hesitation.

"I know..." Wonho paused. He noticed that they'd brought a lunch for him, but he wasn't inclined to eat it at the moment. "I know that I...I used to be Nathan...or someone else...but I'm...I'm Shin Hoseok now, so, if you could call me that..." The tensed his shoulders as he awaited their response.

Shownu just nodded with a small smile. "All right, Hoseok."

Changkyun just nodded, keeping his eyes down. Wonho felt like he was still mad at him for whatever had happened earlier with Hyungwon, but he didn't even understand what had happened, let alone how it was his fault.

"Just so you know," Shownu went on, the only one making an effort to clear the tension in the room. "They told us your real name before you came in, and we all started calling you Wonho. As a nickname. We can call you that, if you like. Or if you want us to call you Hoseok, we could do that too."

Wonho paused, feeling his heart flutter at the bit at the thought of people caring about his comfort and well-being even when they  _knew_  how messed-up he was. "I...I'd like that. Wonho, I mean." His cheeks flushed slightly as he thought about the nickname they'd created especially for him, to stay with him no matter who he thought he was. "Thank you," he added. Shownu just smiled and resumed eating.

Wonho took a moment to look over at Changkyun, who was still avoiding eye contact with him. He briefly glanced at the thinnest boy of the lot, who rested on his desk in an unnatural sleep, before looking back at Changkyun. "I'm...sorry...about this morning. I don't know what happened, but-"

"You touched him, didn't you?" Changkyun asked, looking up and holding his fork still. He realized how strange he was acting. It wasn't that he'd never liked Hyungwon, but they'd never been close in all his time here. Minhyuk was the communal best friend, always buddying up to the new kid. Kihyun being friends with Hyungwon had been odd but ultimately short-lived. Jooheon being friends with Hyungwon had been equally odd. Maybe that was why Changkyun had never really gotten involved with Hyungwon, because he'd already surrounded himself with a bizarre assortment of strange, unhappy people.

But even Changkyun had felt bad for the boy, watching as his friends left him one by one. Even Wonho had left him in the end. And Shownu...Changkyun had never understood Shownu, but even now that they were sharing a room, Shownu didn't seem any closer to him than before. There was a strange distance around him, a distance he'd created himself, that made real connection near impossible.

And there was something else, too. At the breakfast table, when they'd called him a liar, Hyungwon said he believed Changkyun. Even if Hyungwon was lying, those were words Changkyun had needed to hear, and he was still grateful to Hyungwon for that, even if he'd never actually thanked him.

Maybe it didn't matter how he felt about it all, maybe he was just acting protective of the narcoleptic boy because of what he'd discussed during his family visit, but in the end, it still left him feeling angry, mainly at Wonho, as unfair as that might be. "Hyungwon doesn't like to be touched. I don't really know why, Kihyun or-" Changkyun stopped himself from accidentally saying  _Nathan_ , "-Kihyun would know best. But Hyungwon hates being touched. At least, not without asking."

Wonho vaguely recalled having reached out to tap Hyungwon, accidentally grazing his neck with a finger, and the thin boy shooting back away from him and slamming into the wall.

Whatever was wrong with Hyungwon, it was strong enough to cause him to inflict bodily harm on himself rather than face the discomfort of another person's physical contact.

Changkyun caught Wonho staring at Hyungwon and realized that he'd left something out. "He might just drop unconscious at times. He said he's narcoleptic. If that happens, it's your job to carry him back to the room since you guys share it, okay?"

Changkyun was surprised to feel his brow creased with worry.

 _It's not my problem anyway,_  he tried to convince himself, but when he looked over to see the pale teen next to him, his stomach churned slightly, the acids building up as his anxiety heightened.  _He's not my problem,_  he told himself once more, but he didn't feel at all reassured.

He remembered when Hyungwon was the new kid, when everyone treated him like he didn't belong, like he wasn't one of them. And then whatever Kihyun and Wonho witnessed changed that. He went from being  _one of them_  to  _one of us_.

Knowing that Hyungwon was as screwed-up as the rest of them had been a relief for everyone. Traumatic experiences and mental scars were the stitches that held them together. To be "okay" was to be wrong, and the more messed-up you were, the more you fit in.

It was odd, considering how it had all flipped; in the beginning, Hyungwon was an outsider, Wonho one of the group, but now Wonho was officially  _okay_  and Hyungwon was rather unofficially  _not okay_ , and everything was a mess.

Which was what it was supposed to be, Changkyun figured, but it didn't make it make any more sense.


	44. Chapter 44

Changkyun couldn't sleep. A lot was on his mind, for sure, but he'd also been woken up by Shownu, who had a habit of sleep-talking in the middle of the night. Usually, Changkyun just sat there and remained silent, letting himself relax back into sleep, but for the moment, he just sat there and listened.

"No, I shouldn't," Shownu mumbled. "That's bad. I shouldn't do that." A pause. "I know, but...no, I understand, I didn't mean to...okay, you know that I-"

"Shownu, can you be quiet?" Changkyun asked as he shifted in his bed, too frustrated with the conflict of the day to deal with the conflict of the night.

There was a momentary silence followed by the rustling of sheets as Shownu turned, and Changkyun sighed in relief and closed his eyes.

He couldn't see it in the darkness, but Shownu's eyes were still wide open.

***

In the darkness of the next room over, Hyungwon was curled up against the wall, his chest rising and falling rapidly as he tried to even out his breathing, but every time he got close to a state of calm, the panic would flare up again, and he'd be back where he started. He'd woken up from a dream as usual, but they were getting harder to handle. Kihyun was gone, and Nathan was effectively gone. Hyungwon was alone.

The dark made it worse. He felt that if he could see, if he could just see that everything was all right and okay and that  _he_ was all right and okay, then...then it would be better, somehow. He knew it wasn't logical, but...the dark was a petri dish for fear, letting it grow and contaminate every inch of Hyungwon.

But he couldn't make a sound, or he'd wake Wonho, and then Wonho would look at him again like he had a few months ago, like Hyungwon was...inhuman.

So Hyungwon stayed huddled against the wall, wrapping his blanket over his head, and rocking back and forth, his spine hitting the hard concrete every other second, and waited for morning to come.

***

The four of them gathered at the breakfast table the next day. It felt wrong sitting there, four where there used to be seven. They didn't have to use their elbows to secure a bit more territory. There was altogether too much space now.

The table was silent at first. Shownu was content to just continue living in his head thinking about whatever it was that occupied the majority of his thoughts, and Hyungwon was only barely conscious, having been up for hours in the middle of the night as his panic attack had raged onward. Wonho didn't know anyone well enough to force small talk, which left...

Changkyun. He looked between Wonho and Hyungwon, figuring that it was up to him to say something, but he didn't know what he was allowed to say and what was off-limits. He supposed that that's why Kihyun had been a good friend to Hyungwon, because Kihyun had understood those invisible boundaries better than most people, and judging from how the two interacted, Kihyun understood what Hyungwon was willing to divulge. Changkyun was only just starting to build up a relationship with Hyungwon, though, and he didn't want to ruin it by saying something that would hurt Hyungwon or send him into a mental breakdown.

"Hey," he said, silently hoping to himself that if he just broke the silence, someone else would pave the way. He cleared his throat when nobody did. "How are you feeling today?" he asked Hyungwon, trying not to sound too concerned. He was to an extent, though. He'd noticed how thin and pale Hyungwon was getting, and Hyungwon's recent instability didn't seem to be making anything of a positive impact on that.

Hyungwon's eyes took a second to look up and meet Changkyun's before they fell back down to his tray as though he couldn't sustain the effort. "I'm feeling great," he mumbled, his voice hollow, followed by the almost involuntary, "How are you?"

"I'm, uh, I'm okay," Changkyun said, realizing that he'd failed, but damn it, he didn't know what to say to the other boy. He barely knew him at all. He knew nothing about his family, how his narcolepsy had developed, how long he'd been narcoleptic, and why else he was here.

They were practically strangers.

"Hey," Wonho said, and Changkyun looked up, thinking that he was being admonished for his pitiful attempt to spark conversation, but instead, Wonho was looking over at Hyungwon. "You have to eat something, man. Come on, I know it's early and the food sort of sucks, but try and get something in your stomach, yeah?"

Hyungwon didn't react for a second, and Changkyun felt that if the chair wasn't holding Hyungwon up, he'd have collapsed on the floor already. Then he moved to pick up his fork and began placing forkful after forkful of food in his mouth. He'd chew for a moment, swallow, and proceed onto the next forkful. It was less that he was doing it of any will of his own and moreso that he was too tired to function any other way than by following instructions.

"Good job," Wonho said with a smile, although Changkyun read the concern in his eyes. He was confused, though; yesterday, Wonho had resumed his original identity and had treated them like strangers, and yet here he was, taking care of Hyungwon as though he'd never become Shin Hoseok.

 _Maybe that was just part of him all along,_  Changkyun thought to himself.  _Maybe he just can't help himself from picking up a charity case._  He winced as he realized how harsh that sounded, especially toward Hyungwon, the charity case in question.

 _Maybe he's just a good person,_  he thought instead, but the thought was alien to him. In a place like that, it was hard to imagine anyone being genuinely good and selfless.


	45. Chapter 45

Despite Changkyun's misgivings, Wonho continued to take care of and look after Hyungwon all day. He'd moved his desk next to Hyungwon's (he'd originally tried to sit in Minhyuk's desk, but Hyungwon had started hyperventilating, so he'd just gingerly pushed Minhyuk's desk into the corner before dragging his own over). He made little jokes throughout class, jokes that Hyungwon didn't laugh at, but he tried to make Hyungwon feel included nonetheless. He doodled in Hyungwon's notebook, as Hyungwon had given up on bothering to take notes. At lunch, he sat next to Hyungwon and once again made sure that he ate.

Changkyun didn't understand, but he didn't need to, because Hyungwon wasn't his problem, Wonho wasn't his problem, neither of them were any of his business at all. And yet...

And yet he found his eyes trailing after Hyungwon, scanning him to see if his legs were shaking, if he was about to collapse; taking in the shadows beneath Hyungwon's eyes, the ones that said that last night had been bad, that he was struggling; searching Hyungwon's eyes for the spark that used to be there, the spark that said that Hyungwon knew he wasn't okay but he was okay with that.

The spark was gone, had been gone for a while, but Changkyun still searched for it.

His eyes caught on Wonho too, for different reasons, mainly because he was trying to puzzle him out. Hyungwon was dying inside his mind, and Changkyun understood that to a degree because they'd all been there at some point, chained to an anchor and heading nowhere but down, but Wonho was a new mystery to Changkyun.

***

Hyungwon collapsed later that day, and Changkyun was both frustrated and relieved that Wonho had been the one to catch him and transport him safely to their room. It wasn't that Changkyun was jealous, he had no reason to be, but...something about the whole situation aggravated him.

Wonho returned to their classroom ten minutes after setting Hyungwon down to rest, and Changkyun watched him from the moment he entered the room to the moment he sat back down in his desk.

Wonho turned, sensing someone staring at him, and met Changkyun's eyes.

Changkyun stared back coolly while struggling to think of something to say. "Is he all right?" he asked. It was a stupid question. Changkyun knew that Hyungwon was all right; he'd fainted dozens of times. This was routine. Normal. Normal for an abnormal person.

Wonho, thankfully, didn't seem to realize how stupid of a question it was, most likely since for Shin Hoseok, this was the first time Hyungwon had passed out and the first time Wonho had caught him, even if it had in reality happened so many more times. "I think he didn't get much sleep last night, is all. He looked a little dead today."

Changkyun wanted to say,  _That's how he always looks now,_  but he kept the words to himself. Shin Hoseok didn't know a Jooheon, nor did he know a Minhyuk or a Kihyun. Trying to explain the toll their losses had taken on Hyungwon seemed an impossible task. After all, logically speaking, shouldn't they be happy for the others, who had passed their evaluations and escaped a den of misery while everyone else still grappled with their demons?

But they hadn't lost loose associates; they'd lost  _family_. For many of them, M-wing was the closest thing they had to a family. For Minhyuk, Kihyun, Jooheon, and Hyungwon especially, since they didn't have very good relationships with their families in the first place. Maybe that was why they had become so close. Because people like Changkyun and Shownu and even Wonho had people they wanted to get home to.

How do you explain to a stranger that a boy doesn't look dead inside due to sleep deprivation but from losing three members of his family?

Changkyun didn't think that Wonho would understand.

But Wonho surprised him.

"Something's wrong with him, Changkyun," he said, before flushing in humiliation as he hurried onward. "I don't mean- I don't mean to be offensive or anything, I just mean that...it's like there's a little part of him that's broken." Wonho licked his lips nervously, unsure as to whether his classmate would agree with him or think him crazy. Which was ironic given the setting. "I honestly don't know how to help him, but I don't want to just let him get worse. Isn't there...isn't there something we can do?"

Changkyun tightened his lips, looking down, repeating the familiar words in his head:

_He's not your problem._

_He's not your problem._

_He's not-_

"I don't know how I would be able to help either," Changkyun mumbled, ignoring the self-serving mantra in his skull. "I don't know what's really wrong with him. I mean, I know why he's depressed right now, but I don't know what's been going on with him since before he got here. That's something else that probably only Dr. Irving knows. I can't...I can't help him."

_I can't help him._

Changkyun felt his heart sink, and he didn't understand why.

_I need to focus on myself, on getting better, on passing my evaluations. I can't worry about someone else and mess up my progress. I can't- I can't-_

_I can't help him._

But if his heart had made up its mind to turn away, then why did it hurt so much?

Why was it that all he wanted to do was put Hyungwon back together again?


	46. Chapter 46

Hyungwon didn't wake up until the next day, and when he did, he was in a state of confusion for the majority of the morning, unsure as to why he had to leave the room and being stubborn so far as to refuse to get dressed.

Wonho was patient with the boy, aware that if he pushed or pulled too hard, he would end up ruining Hyungwon's recovery, so he just repeated himself as necessary and gently urged the taller boy to action.

He wasn't sure what more he could do other than strongly suggest (i.e. force) Hyungwon to eat properly and get rest. He honestly wasn't sure why he was so invested in a stranger, but he did feel guilty for accidentally setting him off the other day without meaning to, and a large part of his character was made up of selflessness, unable to watch as someone struggled without throwing in a helping hand. He knew by the way Changkyun watched him with narrowed eyes that he hadn't won over any trust with the others, but he couldn't worry about that now; he only had the capacity to worry about his roommate.

They were both lying down in their beds, waiting for the lights to turn off, when Hyungwon spoke. It was odd enough that he'd talked; he did that very little, Wonho had discovered. What made it even more rare was that he wasn't answering a question or replying to something Wonho had said. Instead, he was starting a conversation, and Wonho wasn't sure if he'd even heard Hyungwon start one before.

"Do you...no, you don't," Hyungwon finished his own thought with a breathy laugh, his soft voice raspy against the walls, which deadened the sound.

"Do I what?" Wonho asked, unwilling to just let Hyungwon's attempt die.  _This is progress,_  he thought to himself. A good sign. He needed to take it.

"Do you remember...well, it's pointless," Hyungwon said, laying his hands across his stomach and staring up at the ceiling. He never looked over at Wonho.

"No, tell me," Wonho said, sitting up and looking at Hyungwon, giving him his full attention.

"When you were Nathan, you used to work out every night," Hyungwon said after a moment. There was something Wonho hadn't heard in his voice before. Fondness, perhaps. Or maybe Wonho was just surprised by how lucid Hyungwon sounded for once.

Wonho laughed, not because he really found anything to be funny, but because laughing might make Hyungwon feel more supported or confident. "Dr. Irving mentioned that I...that Nathan was an exercise buff."

"Yeah," Hyungwon said, and something in Hyungwon's voice made Wonho wish for a moment that he were still Nathan. But that was stupid; he was Shin Hoseok, and that's all he ever wanted to be for the rest of his life. "Nathan made me do push-ups," Hyungwon mumbled, surprising a genuine laugh out of Wonho, but when Hyungwon went on, Wonho grew quiet. "Nathan said...that physical activity...it helps you. Your body, and your mind."

Wonho tried to figure out where Hyungwon was going, but he couldn't predict anything about the boy.

"I know you're not...you're not Nathan," Hyungwon went on, still not looking over, "but...could you...could we...do that again?"

Wonho's eyebrows lifted, as this was the first time he'd heard Hyungwon voice that he wanted to get better. "You want us to exercise every night?"

There was a long moment of stillness before Hyungwon nodded, possibly afraid of Wonho's reply, but Wonho just grinned.

"Sure, I'd love to," he said, and Hyungwon's eyes flicked over to find his. "We can even start ton-"

The overheard lights flickered off.

"...tomorrow," Wonho said with a chuckle. "Does that sound all right with you?"

He was met with silence, and after a few minutes, Wonho sighed, figuring that Hyungwon had gone to sleep, but just as he began to lay down, he heard a soft voice in the darkness.

"Thank you, Hoseok."


	47. Chapter 47

"He's very kind to me," Hyungwon went on about his roommate. "He's been exercising with me before we sleep. And he talks to me, and he sits next to me in class, and he helps me if I pass out." He paused. "I guess he's always done all that. He's just always been nice to me."

Dr. Irving smiled briefly at Hyungwon before scribbling on his notepad. He knew that, out of professional courtesy, it was his job to inform Hyungwon that Shin Hoseok would likely be out of their program within the month, but he'd only just begun to see a positive change in Hyungwon, and he didn't want to jeopardize that. In fact, this was the most Hyungwon had talked in the past few weeks, and the majority of the conversation had been about Hoseok and not Hyungwon.

Dr. Irving figured that that was just the kind of person Hyungwon was, one who treasured relationships with others more than he valued himself. There was danger there for sure, but the preference itself wasn't wrong, only in the occasions where a person couldn't regulate their attachments in regards to their personal health. Which, true, Hyungwon struggled with, but Dr. Irving knew that if he attempted to isolate Hyungwon and kill his dependence on others, he'd be killing Hyungwon, too. He'd honestly been quite worried about the thin boy for the past month or two, and having Hoseok support Hyungwon was the best outcome that could have occurred. Not only was Hyungwon forming a positive relationship, but unlike his relationship with Nathan in which Hyungwon had known that Nathan's identity had been part of Hoseok's condition, Hyungwon was now being accepted and cared about by someone who had moved past his illness.

To simplify it, Hyungwon was being accepted by someone who was normal, even though Hyungwon himself was different. Considering all the "normal" people who had rejected him in his life - his mother, his father, likely the other students at his school - Hoseok's acceptance meant the world to him.

Even if he had a hard time expressing it beyond short, simple sentences.

Dr. Irving listened to Hyungwon talked about his classmates until their time ran out, and then he wished Hyungwon good luck for the next week, complimenting him on his progress, before stepping into the next room.

"Hoseok," he greeted with a smile. "How are you doing?"

Hoseok looked up, a small smile on his lips. He was fully clothed, as he was still being allowed to forego the physical part of his examination for the time being, and instead was only being examined psychologically. "I'm doing well, thanks."

Dr. Irving nodded as he sat down in a chair, shuffling Hoseok's file to the top of his clipboard. "I just want to start off by thanking you for support Hyungwon as much as you have been. I know it hasn't been easy for you, adjusting to your original identity - I don't want to call it your  _real_  identity because all of your identities were real to you in the moment - but...what was I saying?" He nodded as he recaptured his train of thought. "I'm not allowed to divulge what was said in my session with Hyungwon exactly, but he spoke very highly of you, and I'm extremely grateful that you've made such a positive impact on him."

Wonho flushed slightly, not adept at handling compliments or gratitude. "It's nothing, I was just looking out for him...We're roommates and all...but..." He paused, licking his bottom lip before looking back up at Dr. Irving, his hands clasped together loosely. "I know...I know that our information is confidential, but...is there anything you can tell me about Hyungwon? About what's wrong with him, or how I'm supposed to help him?" Wonho flinched as the image of his fingers brushing Hyungwon's neck and Hyungwon forcefully pushing back against the wall. "Because I...there are triggers that I don't know about, and...I don't know what will help him and what will hurt him...so...I'm afraid..." He trailed off.

"What are you afraid of, Hoseok?" Dr. Irving asked, tilting his head. Even if Hyungwon was the subject, Hoseok was his patient, too.

"I'm afraid of hurting him somehow." Wonho huffed, clenching his fingers together. "Isn't there anything you can tell me?"

Dr. Irving scrunched his nose. Hoseok had put him in a tricky spot; it was true that much of Hyungwon's private and medical information was confidential, but Dr. Irving truly believed that Hoseok was somehow a part of Hyungwon's recovery, and if Hoseok could influence Hyungwon's mental health... "Helping Hyungwon through his condition is my job," Dr. Irving said kindly, still unsure as to how to respond.

Wonho leaned forward, forearms on his knees. "Please, anything, it doesn't have to be big or important, but...he's afraid of something, and I just...it's hard to see him like that. Afraid. In pain. Alone."

Dr. Irving sighed. "I can't release any sensitive information to you," he said slowly. "At least, nothing specific. But..."

Wonho's eyes lit up.

"All I can tell you is that Hyungwon has something similar to a recurring nightmare. I can't tell you what it's about; that's for Hyungwon to share. But that is most likely his main source of anxiety," Dr. Irving said, already feeling a bit guilty toward Hyungwon for exposing even such topical information without his permission, but deep down, he knew that whatever he'd been trying to accomplish with Hyungwon had been failing so far. He could only hope that Wonho would be able to help Hyungwon in a way that he himself couldn't.

But Wonho didn't have much time to do it, whatever  _it_  was.

"He's very kind to me," Hyungwon went on about his roommate. "He's been exercising with me before we sleep. And he talks to me, and he sits next to me in class, and he helps me if I pass out." He paused. "I guess he's always done all that. He's just always been nice to me."

Dr. Irving smiled briefly at Hyungwon before scribbling on his notepad. He knew that, out of professional courtesy, it was his job to inform Hyungwon that Shin Hoseok would likely be out of their program within the month, but he'd only just begun to see a positive change in Hyungwon, and he didn't want to jeopardize that. In fact, this was the most Hyungwon had talked in the past few weeks, and the majority of the conversation had been about Hoseok and not Hyungwon.

Dr. Irving figured that that was just the kind of person Hyungwon was, one who treasured relationships with others more than he valued himself. There was danger there for sure, but the preference itself wasn't wrong, only in the occasions where a person couldn't regulate their attachments in regards to their personal health. Which, true, Hyungwon struggled with, but Dr. Irving knew that if he attempted to isolate Hyungwon and kill his dependence on others, he'd be killing Hyungwon, too. He'd honestly been quite worried about the thin boy for the past month or two, and having Hoseok support Hyungwon was the best outcome that could have occurred. Not only was Hyungwon forming a positive relationship, but unlike his relationship with Nathan in which Hyungwon had known that Nathan's identity had been part of Hoseok's condition, Hyungwon was now being accepted and cared about by someone who had moved past his illness.

To simplify it, Hyungwon was being accepted by someone who was normal, even though Hyungwon himself was different. Considering all the "normal" people who had rejected him in his life - his mother, his father, likely the other students at his school - Hoseok's acceptance meant the world to him.

Even if he had a hard time expressing it beyond short, simple sentences.

Dr. Irving listened to Hyungwon talked about his classmates until their time ran out, and then he wished Hyungwon good luck for the next week, complimenting him on his progress, before stepping into the next room.

"Hoseok," he greeted with a smile. "How are you doing?"

Hoseok looked up, a small smile on his lips. He was fully clothed, as he was still being allowed to forego the physical part of his examination for the time being, and instead was only being examined psychologically. "I'm doing well, thanks."

Dr. Irving nodded as he sat down in a chair, shuffling Hoseok's file to the top of his clipboard. "I just want to start off by thanking you for support Hyungwon as much as you have been. I know it hasn't been easy for you, adjusting to your original identity - I don't want to call it your  _real_  identity because all of your identities were real to you in the moment - but...what was I saying?" He nodded as he recaptured his train of thought. "I'm not allowed to divulge what was said in my session with Hyungwon exactly, but he spoke very highly of you, and I'm extremely grateful that you've made such a positive impact on him."

Wonho flushed slightly, not adept at handling compliments or gratitude. "It's nothing, I was just looking out for him...We're roommates and all...but..." He paused, licking his bottom lip before looking back up at Dr. Irving, his hands clasped together loosely. "I know...I know that our information is confidential, but...is there anything you can tell me about Hyungwon? About what's wrong with him, or how I'm supposed to help him?" Wonho flinched as the image of his fingers brushing Hyungwon's neck and Hyungwon forcefully pushing back against the wall. "Because I...there are triggers that I don't know about, and...I don't know what will help him and what will hurt him...so...I'm afraid..." He trailed off.

"What are you afraid of, Hoseok?" Dr. Irving asked, tilting his head. Even if Hyungwon was the subject, Hoseok was his patient, too.

"I'm afraid of hurting him somehow." Wonho huffed, clenching his fingers together. "Isn't there anything you can tell me?"

Dr. Irving scrunched his nose. Hoseok had put him in a tricky spot; it was true that much of Hyungwon's private and medical information was confidential, but Dr. Irving truly believed that Hoseok was somehow a part of Hyungwon's recovery, and if Hoseok could influence Hyungwon's mental health... "Helping Hyungwon through his condition is my job," Dr. Irving said kindly, still unsure as to how to respond.

Wonho leaned forward, forearms on his knees. "Please, anything, it doesn't have to be big or important, but...he's afraid of something, and I just...it's hard to see him like that. Afraid. In pain. Alone."

Dr. Irving sighed. "I can't release any sensitive information to you," he said slowly. "At least, nothing specific. But..."

Wonho's eyes lit up.

"All I can tell you is that Hyungwon has something similar to a recurring nightmare. I can't tell you what it's about; that's for Hyungwon to share. But that is most likely his main source of anxiety," Dr. Irving said, already feeling a bit guilty toward Hyungwon for exposing even such topical information without his permission, but deep down, he knew that whatever he'd been trying to accomplish with Hyungwon had been failing so far. He could only hope that Wonho would be able to help Hyungwon in a way that he himself couldn't.

But Wonho didn't have much time to do it, whatever  _it_  was.


	48. Chapter 48

_Recurring nightmare,_  Wonho mulled in his mind as he walked back to their shared room. In a way, he regretted asking Dr. Irving since he was now more curious than before, but he knew that he couldn't just go up to Hyungwon and ask him what his nightmares were about. But he did want to know. He wondered if it had anything to do with how Hyungwon didn't like being touched.

He knew somewhere in the back of his mind that it wasn't his job to fix Hyungwon and that the taller boy wasn't his responsibility or burden to carry, but...

He had a few weeks before he could leave, anyway. May as well try to make a positive impact for the remainder of his time here. Even if Changkyun was always shooting him dirty looks.

***

Wonho got back to their room, and he and Hyungwon did a short exercise routine before changing and laying down. The lights went off, but Wonho didn't go to sleep. He kept his arms folded behind his head and just stared at what he thought was the ceiling. The darkness obscured nearly everything.

Logically speaking, in that same pragmatic part of his brain that often reminded him that Hyungwon was not a helpless child and that he didn't need to do anything for the boy, he knew that he should close his eyes. Go to sleep. Why not? He was accomplishing nothing burning the night away.

And yet...

In the less logical side of his brain, the side that said he didn't need to have a reason to treat other people like human beings, he felt that he needed to stay awake. He wasn't sure why. He didn't have a reason for that, either. It was just...intuition. A feeling. A feeling that was keeping him awake for what he hoped was a good reason (even if he himself hadn't figured it out yet).

The night was silent for a long time. Two, perhaps three hours. He'd been fighting off drowsiness for a bit, and he was beginning to resign himself to the fact that there'd been no reason to stay up in the first place.

But then a few more minutes passed, and the reason came.

It came in the sound of quick, uneven breaths, in soft whimpers, in the clawing of hands against bed sheets.

The noises scared Wonho at first, made him want to close his eyes and pray for morning, but then he realized.

_Recurring nightmare._

Hyungwon was having another panic attack, alone, in the dark, in the middle of the night.

Wonho rolled out of his own bed, planting his feet steadily on the floor before resting his palm against the wall and tracing the contours of the room, leading himself to Hyungwon's bed. "Hyungwon?" he whispered before realizing that Hyungwon could still be in the middle of the nightmare and that perhaps talking would make something worse. So he continued trailing along the wall until his right thigh bumped into something soft, Hyungwon's mattress he guessed, and he patted around with his hand to confirm his suspicions.

Now that he was this close, however, he realized that he didn't know what to do. He couldn't touch Hyungwon and risk escalating his anxiety. And Wonho wasn't very good with words, especially not in these sort of situations. Not that he really had a category to put the situation in. He'd never had to deal with something like this before, not that he could remember.

So how was he supposed to help Hyungwon?

After another agonizing thirty seconds of listening to Hyungwon's panicked breathing from the corner of the room, Wonho decided that he had to say something. Either to wake him up if he wasn't already conscious, or to calm him down. And then maybe, maybe Hyungwon would ask for a hug, or maybe Wonho would offer one. He wasn't sure how comprehensible Hyungwon was going to be, if at all.

But he didn't really have any other options than to lie in his bed and ignore what was happening.

"Hyungwon," he said, his voice still soft but clear. "Hyungwon," he repeated when he heard nothing new from the other side of the bed. He followed the edge of the mattress. He sensed Hyungwon rather than heard him, felt the waves of fear radiating outward from the corner of the room.

He had to make a decision.

Touch, or don't touch.

He hesitated for one moment before reaching out and gently taking hold of Hyungwon's shoulders, knowing there was no other way to comfort him. Hyungwon jerked back, but Wonho kept a firm enough grip on him to make sure that he didn't hit the wall again. After a moment, Hyungwon shuddered, his breaths suddenly becoming more shallow.

"Kihyun, I need..." Hyungwon mumbled, his voice low and frantic. "Kihyun-"

Wonho didn't know much of Kihyun, but from what the others had said, he knew enough about the unknown boy to gather that he wasn't coming back. "Hyungwon, I'm here, okay?" Wonho hesitated before rubbing Hyungwon's back slowly, trying not to startle him. He honestly still wasn't sure if Hyungwon was talking in his sleep or if he'd woken up.

Hyungwon's breathing slowly evened out as the tension left his body. After a few minutes, he was completely limp in Wonho's arms.

Wonho exhaled deeply before carefully easing Hyungwon down so his head was resting on the pillow once more. He stayed for a moment to make sure Hyungwon was asleep before returning to his own bed.

He wondered if anything would be different in the morning.


	49. Chapter 49

The morning was different in that Hyungwon didn't seem to remember having said anything last night or having a panic attack at all. Wonho supposed that maybe it was because they happened so often that it had ceased to be abnormal, which was worrying in its own way.

The week passed in the same manner, with Wonho staying up late every night until he was either sure that Hyungwon was all right or that he knew Hyungwon needed help. He was tired all the time, but he knew it was nothing compared to how exhausted Hyungwon felt all the time.

The week rolled around slowly, night by night, until Sunday evaluations.

"How are things going?" Dr. Irving asked Wonho.

"Fine," Wonho said before realizing it sounded dismissive. "I mean, good, I guess."

Dr. Irving looked up, examining Wonho's face, and frowned. "What about sleep? Are you getting enough? You seem less well-rested than last week. Do you have any problems? Or is it harmful for your health for you to be in the same room as Hyungwon? We can arrange something else-"

"No, I'm fine with my room," Wonho said quickly. "And I'm all right, just stayed up too late recently. But...about Hyungwon..."

Dr. Irving sighed, adjusting his glasses. "Hoseok, I truly appreciate the care you've shown for him, but if you continue to let him rely on you this much, you'll just be handicapping his progress when you leave."

Wonho flinched. He'd been so wrapped up in helping his roommate that he'd forgotten about his imminent departure. "Right, well...uh, I..." He swallowed before remembering what he wanted to say. "Well, actually, I had an idea that would actually help with that. It was mainly to help Hyungwon in general but it could work for that too."

Dr. Irving tilted his head slightly before nodding for Wonho to go on.

"Well, you see..."

***

Sunday rolled into Monday into Tuesday and so on. Hyungwon seemed somewhat preoccupied throughout the week, like he was thinking hard about something but was unable to find the answer. Wonho supported him the only way he could, through their nightly workouts and through staying up later at night.

Thursday night, he had no problem staying up. He had too much to think about for once. The way Dr. Irving had explained it to him, he had to pass two psych evaluations (which he had) before his parents would be notified. Usually, the parents would come in during visiting hours to discuss with their child whether or not the child thought it would be best to stay in the program or if they wanted to leave immediately.

Wonho didn't even know if his mom would come. His dad had died when he was little, so he'd always been close with his mother, but she hadn't come to see him in his time here (Dr. Irving had informed her that it might place increased anxiety on Wonho, who likely wouldn't recognize her in his fugue state). And if she  _did_  come, what would she say? What would happen to Wonho?

What would happen to Hyungwon?

***

Friday morning came, although Wonho was unsure as to when he'd drifted off. Last night had been uneventful. No panic attacks. It had been just him and his thoughts.

He was jolted out of his thoughts once more as the door opened and a ward guard stepped in. "Chae Hyungwon," the guard announced, looking over at the boy in question, who just shook his head from his slumped-over position on his desk.

"I don't want to see them."

Wonho swallowed. "You should go, Hyungwon."

Hyungwon frowned at Wonho. "No. I don't want to. They stare at me like a bug in a cage. I don't want to play that game anymore."

"Please, Hyungwon," Wonho tried. "Just go one more time. You can say goodbye to them if you want. Just, go for today, okay?"

Hyungwon frowned once more before sitting up, his irritation clear. "Stop telling me what to do," he mumbled even as he stood and left the room.

Wonho sighed in relief. Now he just had to hope that Dr. Irving had gotten his suggestion approved.

***

Hyungwon took a seat in the familiar metal chair. He was mad at Wonho for making him come, he was mad at himself for doing it anyway, and he was mad at his parents. Why did they keep coming to see him if it was clear that they didn't care for him at all?

He kept his eyes on the ground as the door in the other room opened. He had half a mind to just walk out of the room, but he couldn't bring himself to. After a moment, he picked up the phone, still not looking up, and held it a few inches away from his ear. He figured that maybe he could have the satisfaction of slamming it back on the hook after his mother told him how disappointed she was in him.

But the voice on the other end was not his mother, and as he realized this, he jolted up, his eyes tracing upward across the glass until they met someone else's.

"Hey, Skeleton. You look like shit."


	50. Chapter 50

"Hey, Skeleton. You look like shit."

Hyungwon stared across the glass at Jooheon. "You..."

Jooheon sighed before leaning on the counter. "No, I'm not your mom. Get over it already."

Hyungwon coughed, too surprised to reply at first, before mumbling, "Why are you here?"

"Ouch," Jooheon said, clutching at his chest before rolling his eyes. "So listen, I get a call from Dr. Irving saying that you aren't doing well and that I need to come in and talk to you." Jooheon studied Hyungwon closely. "You really do look like shit, by the way."

"Thanks," Hyungwon mumbled, and he wanted to look down, but he couldn't look away from Jooheon. "How is...your mom doing?"

Jooheon looked surprised that Hyungwon had brought her up at all. "She's doing all right. She's better off without my dad, even if she doesn't see that yet." He leaned forward, resting his elbow on his knee. "I think she's worrying too much about me, though. Wondering if I can make good enough grades after being out of school for so long, wondering how long I'll stay good for, wondering what's going to happen if I can't pass a college entrance exam..." Jooheon blew out a long breath. "Maybe I should've just stayed here. It's this nice little bubble, you know. You forget what's going on outside. You forget that time doesn't wait for you, just keeps on plowing along."

Hyungwon stayed quiet. He was content in the bubble. He didn't want to leave.

Jooheon seemed to sense that from the other end of the phone and he sighed. "I didn't mean that you should- shit, see, this is why I told them it would be a bad idea," he said, rubbing at his temple. "Why did they think that I would be able to help? I haven't been helpful to anyone since...ever, really. I just cause problems." He exhaled, baring his teeth at the glass. "Look, I'm screwing this up, but whatever. I know you think that you just want to stay here forever and ignore the outside world, but you can't do that, okay? And I know I can't say anything about your family because I don't know shit about them, but...you can't expect everyone that's left in M-wing to stick around just for you. They've got families too, lives outside of here that they want to get back to. Changkyun's got his mom, Shownu's got his parents, Wonho's got...somebody, I don't really know who. But they can't stay forever just because you don't want to leave. Eventually, they're going to go, and you're going to be all alone. Is that what you want, Hyungwon?"

Hyungwon bit his lip, hard. He didn't bother replying because it was clear to both of them how he felt about being alone.

"You realize that it's selfish to ask that of them, right?" Jooheon restated, and Hyungwon finally broke eye contact, looking down, feeling heat flood to his face. He was ashamed, ashamed of how he felt like they owed it to him to stay, ashamed of how they all looked at him like they didn't think they could leave him alone, ashamed how they all treated him more delicately than the others because he was weak and couldn't manage himself.

"I just want..." Hyungwon began, but he didn't know how to finish his sentence. What was it that he wanted? Acceptance? Familial love? All of the things he couldn't get from his parents?

"You want someone to believe in you," Jooheon said, and Hyungwon's heart ached because something about Jooheon's direct but soft words reminded him of Kihyun. "That's what you told Changkyun that one time, right? That everyone wants someone to believe in them. That wasn't about Changkyun though, was it?"

Hyungwon felt himself shrinking into the chair, his spine raking against the metal. "I don't...I..."

"So you think that Changkyun deserves that, that he deserves someone to believe him even if he's spouting off nonsense all day, but you don't believe that you deserve that too?"

Hyungwon shifted, drawing his legs to his chest and trying to ignore the racing of his heart. "I don't like all these questions. You're starting to sound like Dr. Irving."

"You don't like them because they hit too close to home," Jooheon said, glaring at Hyungwon as though daring him to actually answer anything that he'd asked. "And I'm not your fucking psychologist, Hyungwon. I'm your friend. I'm a heavily-medicated mess, I generally dislike everyone I meet, and I hate listening to people jabber on about their problems. And yet I'm here, aren't I? Maybe you wanted a different friend, but too bad, I'm the one who showed up to a mental institution to yell at you and tell you to stop spiraling into whatever dark place everyone's trying to drag you out of. Hey. Are you listening to me?"

Hyungwon looked up, having tucked his face down into his knees. "I..."

"Eat. You look like you're starving yourself. I mean, you were pretty bloody thin when you came in, but you're almost nothing now. You gotta take care of yourself, man. And then you stick it to Dr. Irving and everyone by passing those stupid evaluations, and then when you get out, we can hang out in the real world," Jooheon said, his expression aggressive, but his words growing uncertain and slightly awkward as he hit unplanned territory and expressed concern he didn't want to show. "Next time we meet, maybe we won't have a sheet of glass between us. And these damn telephones. I hate how my voice sounds on telephones."

Hyungwon laughed, a breathy, unsupported sound. "Would you really still be my friend if I get out?"

Jooheon snorted. "When, not if, you idiot. And it's not like I have a lot of options friend-wise. I'm the one getting the better end of this deal. I'm trying to swindle you out of here, bro. Cheat you into friendship."

Hyungwon smiled, a nervous, apprehensive smile. "When you were here, you said, you said that we weren't friends."

Jooheon flushed slightly and looked away. "Just- why'd you have to bring that up? Ugh. Just- forget about that, okay?"

"So we're friends?"

Jooheon glared at Hyungwon. "I drove all the way out here back to a place I hate just to spend thirty minutes staring at your ugly face. What does that tell you?"

"I want to hear you say it. You said it once. Just say it again," Hyungwon insisted.

Jooheon rolled his eyes. "Annoying little brat. Just remember what I said, take care of yourself. If you don't, I'll be back here in two weeks to yell at you again."

"Okay, friend. I'll see you in two weeks."

Jooheon glared at him. "I mean it, Skeleton."

"Okay, friend."

Jooheon huffed, pinching his nose. "Fine, friend." He quickly hung up the phone and turned so Hyungwon wouldn't see his embarrassed expression and waved over his shoulder before exiting the room.

Hyungwon watched him leave, a smile on his lips, one that nobody had to tell him to form.


	51. Chapter 51

Wonho watched Hyungwon closely from the moment he entered the room. He wasn't sure what he expected, perhaps...confusion? Maybe relief?

But when he saw Hyungwon walk in smiling, he knew he'd made the right decision in suggesting his idea to Dr. Irving.

"Why do you look so happy?" Changkyun asked, eyeing Hyungwon and wondering what had produced such a change in the boy.

"Jooheon came to see me," Hyungwon responded softly, looking down at the ground, but his smile didn't fade, even as Changkyun's eyes bugged out of his head.

"Jooheon- he came to visit you?" Changkyun repeated, and Hyungwon just bobbed his head, still smiling at the ground as he shifted his balance to his other foot, wringing his hands together to keep them occupied. "The guy who punched you in the head and almost gave you a concussion? That Jooheon?"

Hyungwon opened his mouth before closing it and nodding.

"And that made you happy?" Changkyun asked, skepticism engraved in every line in his face.

Hyungwon shrugged, but his smile seemed permanently etched on his lips. "Yeah, I guess it did."

Wonho contained his smile, not knowing how Hyungwon would react if he found out that his roommate was micromanaging him.

Then the guard entered the room. "Shin Hoseok?"

Wonho swallowed before standing up and exiting the room.

***

"They told me that if I tried to visit you, it might make you more...confused," she said, adjusting in her seat as her eyes dropped briefly before rising to land back on Wonho. "I haven't seen you in months," she said, her voice soft and rough. "I mean, they gave me updates, but...it's not the same thing as seeing your own kid."

"Hi, Mom," Wonho said, his voice slightly unsteady. It was hard to measure how long it had been since he'd seen her, seeing as he hadn't exactly been himself during that time, but it felt like forever. "I missed you."

"I missed you too, baby," she whispered, clutching the phone with both of her hands, as it was her only connection to her son. "I wasn't sure if enrolling you here was the right thing to do but I just didn't know-"

"It's okay, Mom," Wonho said, smiling at her, wanting to reassure her. "What happened was crazy. Obviously that's not in any parenting manual."

"I know you're trying to make me feel better but I felt like I was abandoning you. It felt wrong, leaving you here and letting someone else take care of you," she said, biting her lip. "All that time, wasted."

Wonho thought about his roommate, about the smile that had been absent until today, the smile that he had helped create. "Not wasted."

"Well, Dr. Irving said that you're clear to go," she said, clearing her throat and shifting once more. "I can take you home with me today, even. Do you have a lot to pack?"

"Pack? I..." Wonho found himself at a loss for words. He should want to leave, right? That's what he was supposed to want, right? "Mom, I...I can't...is it possible to wait a little bit?"

"Wait?" she echoed, looking small and lost on the other side of the glass. "Baby, I've been waiting for months. Why do you want to wait?"

"There's...there's someone here, a boy, and he needs my help," he said, staring at his mom and hoping she'd understand that this was serious to him. "And I don't know if he has a mom or dad who cares about him like you care about me. I just...it wouldn't be fair to him if I left so suddenly."

"And it isn't fair of him to you to make you stay," she said, frowning. "Don't you want to come home?"

"Yes, I...yes, Mom, of course, but...can I...can I have a little more time?"

She tightened her lips, her disappointment clear. "Until the next visiting day. That's two weeks ago, okay? I'm taking you home then."

Wonho sighed, partially in relief but also in stress. Two weeks was better than none, but it was still such a short time. "Okay, Mom. I love you."

"I love you too, baby," she whispered, hanging on to the phone and staring at him in silence for a minute as though memorizing his face, a face she hadn't seen in months. Then she placed the phone on the hanger, stood up, and left the room.

***

The next day, Shownu was gone, his half of the room empty and his desk vacant.


	52. Chapter 52

After Shownu left without warning, Changkyun moved into Wonho and Hyungwon's room. At first, Hyungwon was resistant to the idea of anyone else taking the bed that had belonged to Kihyun, but he began to feel guilty knowing that Changkyun was alone every night.

"So listen," Wonho said, pulling Changkyun aside before they got to their room. "Hyungwon gets panic attacks in the middle of the night, and if one of us doesn't snap him out of it, he'll just sit there until morning."

Changkyun stared at Wonho. "Isn't there a way to stop them from happening?"

Wonho shook his head. "I don't know why they happen. But it's almost every night. I think it's part of the reason he was admitted here in the first place."

Changkyun's eyes flashed with interest. He couldn't deny his curiosity. "What are they about?"

"I don't...I don't know," Wonho admitted rather reluctantly. "He hasn't told me. But I think he can't breathe in them, because he wakes up in a panic and starts swallowing too much air at once and starts coughing sometimes."

"Well, look," Changkyun said, fiddling with his fingers. He didn't like bad news in general, but he hated delivering it.

But was it bad news?

It was good news, wasn't it? Good for him?

"I'll help as much as I can but my mom is going to be picking me up soon," Changkyun continued. He looked down.  "She finally broke up with that guy and she said that she could take me home now, as long as I passed two evaluations, and I failed the first one but I passed this one so I just need one more and then, and then..."

"And then Hyungwon will be alone," Wonho said, looking down as well. "I'm...leaving soon. Next time my mom comes."

The two lapsed into a guilty silence while their selfish want to leave ate away at them.

"He'll be okay," Wonho said eventually, and the silence returned, worse this time, because they'd both acknowledged that they wanted to leave, and they didn't want to change that, not even for Hyungwon.

"Yeah," Changkyun mumbled, but for some reason, he felt like shit just saying it. He'd been telling himself for weeks that Hyungwon wasn't his problem, but now it had become tangible, somehow.

He would leave, and Hyungwon would become someone else's problem. Or just his own problem. All by himself.

"Yeah," Changkyun repeated, the image of Hyungwon lying on a bed, the adjacent two mattresses stripped down and barren burned into his mind.

And so Wonho and Changkyun came to a restless agreement of sorts, and time passed in agitated ticks.

***

"And so they called and told me I could visit," Minhyuk rambled on with clear excitement, smiling at the figure on the other side of the glass.

"That's great," Hyungwon said, and he meant it. There were things about Minhyuk that put him a bit on edge, like when Minhyuk started spiraling a bit out of control, becoming almost obsessively positive or dwelling exclusively in his own mind, but Hyungwon had missed their easy, unquestioned friendship. Minhyuk had never put him through an initiation like the others had, treating him as an outsider until he'd shown that he'd belonged. Minhyuk had just accepted him from square one.

And now, how things had reversed.

"How's your mom?" Hyungwon asked, and Minhyuk bit his lip before grinning. Hyungwon knew that meant that Minhyuk would lie, but he decided not to call the other on it.

"She's doing great! She's almost out of rehab," Minhyuk said, prattling on about how hard it had been to convince her to enroll but how effective it had been. Hyungwon, meanwhile, wondered if she'd ever enrolled in the first place.

"That's good," Hyungwon said. He could lie, too. It made other people happy, didn't it? So it was okay, wasn't it?

They chatted about less serious things, things neither of them had to lie about, for another twenty minutes. Minhyuk reminded Hyungwon with a collection of anecdotes about why high school was horrible, and Hyungwon pretended to be jealous that at least that had metal silverware in the cafeteria.

Their time drew to an end, and Hyungwon couldn't help but ask the question that had been buzzing around the back of his mind since he'd seen Minhyuk. "So is Kihyun coming next week? To see me, I mean?"

Minhyuk hesitated, and Hyungwon felt his stomach drop slightly before he made up excuses.

"No, never mind, I'm sorry, I don't know why I assumed...that he'd..." Hyungwon broke off. He was too disappointed. This newfound sadness - that wasn't something he could lie about or feign as nonexistent. It hurt him that Kihyun wouldn't be coming. Minhyuk didn't have to say; Hyungwon had read it in his pause, in his eyes, in the way he leaned back slightly in his chair. But all Hyungwon could wonder was why? Had nobody called Kihyun? Or had they called and he'd said no? Why wouldn't he want to see Hyungwon? Did he not care about Hyungwon?

Was that a lie, too?

"Actually, um, this isn't about Kihyun, but about Wonho," Minhyuk said, playing with the end of his sleeves and not meeting Hyungwon's eyes.

The phone felt too light in his hands, like it might fall at any second. "What about Wonho?"

"You'll probably be seeing him next week," Minhyuk said, his voice falsely cheery.

Another lie. "Of course I'll see him next week, I see him everyday," Hyungwon said, frowning, his mind still preoccupied with all the  _why_ 's behind why Kihyun wouldn't want to see him.

"Well, no, that's..." Minhyuk paused, his voice growing more serious before he tried to force it back into some form of levity. "He wanted me to tell you goodbye."

"Why would he say goodbye?" Hyungwon mumbled, but his mind still wasn't fully processing what Minhyuk was saying.  _Kihyun..._

_There was something else about Kihyun, something I couldn't remember, what was it? Kihyun..._

"He's gone, Hyungwon," Minhyuk said. "While we were talking, Wonho left."


	53. Chapter 53

Hyungwon felt...numb. He felt nothing. Only how nothing could hurt, he didn't know. He felt empty and helpless and betrayed.

Wonho - Nathan and Shin Hoseok and every part of him that made him Hyungwon's friend - had left. He hadn't even stayed to personally say goodbye. Instead, he'd had Minhyuk do it for him.

"Hey," came a half-hearted murmur from the other side of the room. From Kihyun's bed. But Kihyun wasn't in it anymore, just like Wonho wasn't in his bed. "We knew that he had to leave."

"I didn't," Hyungwon mumbled. "I didn't know. He didn't tell me."

"But he got better," Changkyun stressed, sitting up, brows furrowed. He was stressed out, both by how Wonho's absence had affected Hyungwon, but also out of guilt because he knew that it could've been him who had left and hurt Hyungwon. "That's how this place works, Hyungwon. You come in messed-up, and you leave all shiny and new. Wonho got too shiny. He had to go."

There was a long moment of silence in which Changkyun couldn't hear anything, and then suddenly, soft hiccups, like someone was crying. "But I didn't want him to go. Everyone else is already gone. Not him." Another soft sob. "Not him."

The amount of tangible emotions in the room was starting to make Changkyun uncomfortable. He wasn't like Wonho, a born people-person, and he wasn't like Kihyun, someone who could say the one thing that would get through to someone. He was just...Changkyun. And he didn't feel like just Changkyun was enough. "I'm here," he said after a moment. His voice came out weak, cracked, pathetic. A little needy. He wanted to think that Hyungwon would have been this broken if he'd left. It was a dark thought, but...he wanted to be needed by someone. Appreciated. Valued.

His mom had showed up today. He'd been ready to go home. He'd packed everything he owned into the backpack he'd come in with. He was ready to walk out of the institution and back into the larger society he'd been removed from for so long.

But she'd told him with a quick,  _Sorry, Changie, but I can't take you home today. You're not mad at me, are you? Please don't be mad at me, Changie._  Another boyfriend that she couldn't scare off with her mentally-deranged teenage son. Changkyun wasn't sure if it was the same boyfriend or a new one, but it didn't really matter who it was or what their relationship was titled. In the end, it was just another wall that kept her from wanting Changkyun.

He loved her so much, but in the end, he was always an embarrassment to her. Something others couldn't know about.

He'd been so eager to leave, so eager to go with her...

And yet she'd never accept him more than anyone in this place.

Changkyun slipped out from under his covers, fumbling around in the dark under his bed until his hands found what he was looking for. He tugged at the zipper, and it squeaked in the darkness before opening his backpack. He began pulling everything out, strewing items around himself on the floor.

"What are you doing?" came a muffled whisper.

Changkyun just kept emptying his bag. "I'm staying," he said once his hands hit the bottom of the bag.


	54. Chapter 54

Hyungwon got worse, as Changkyun had expected. He'd known that he wouldn't be enough to fill the emptiness Hyungwon felt, but he'd hoped he might be. Inevitably, he wasn't, and Hyungwon once again grew thinner, less  _there_ , physically, mentally.

But it wasn't as bad as before. Changkyun wanted to think it was because of himself.

He got used to waking up in the middle of the night to ragged breathing and soft mutters from the other side of the room. He got used to rubbing Hyungwon's back until Hyungwon's monsters, whatever they were, went away. He got used to Hyungwon mumbling Kihyun's name in the middle of the night and waking up in the morning without remembering a thing.

Never Wonho's name, though. Changkyun found it odd.

But everything about the situation was odd, and he couldn't really pick out a defining characteristic.

Evaluations came and passed for the week. They both failed. Dr. Irving seemed disappointed in Changkyun, who had been trying much harder recently, but who had given up on the hope of leaving. Hyungwon failing, he seemed to expect.

When visitor day arrived, Changkyun was surprised to learn that Jooheon had come to see Hyungwon again and had asked to see Changkyun as well. Of course, if he agreed to see Jooheon, then he wouldn't get to see his mom.

"...Okay," Changkyun had agreed. He had a nagging feeling that his mom hadn't planned on visiting him today anyway.

"So how's it going?" Jooheon asked, leaning back in his chair so the front legs lifted off the ground. The words rolled off his tongue lazily, like he knew he was supposed to ask them at some point, but he didn't really believe in the meaning associated with them.

"You know what it's like," Changkyun replied. Now that he was sitting in the room across from him, he honestly couldn't remember why he'd ever agreed to meet with Jooheon in the first place. They hadn't been friends. Jooheon hadn't even been  _nice_  to him. He hadn't been nice to anybody, except Hyungwon, and he wasn't even  _that_  nice.

"Yeah," Jooheon said, shrugging. There was a moment of silence that neither of them felt like breaking because neither of them had much of anything to say.

"Why are you here?" Changkyun finally asked.

Jooheon stared at him for a few moments before exhaling through his nose and shifting in his seat so his weight was forward. "Just checking in on Skeleton, thought I'd get a look at you while I'm here. Like checking out animals in the zoo."

"Thanks," Changkyun muttered, not bothering to mention that Jooheon had  _been_  one of the animals in the zoo not so long ago. "Why bother seeing me though? For real."

Jooheon shrugged, narrowing his eyes as though deciding how much truth he should reveal. "Just checking up on Skeleton."

"You said that, that's why you're here, to talk to him and-"

"No, that's why I'm here. With you. To check up on him."

Changkyun frowned, leaning forward. "You already talked to him. What the heck do you need me for?"

Jooheon snorted. "You think I can get any answers out of him? He just likes to listen to me talking about my mom and stuff."

Changkyun perked an eyebrow.

"What?" Jooheon asked defensively, shifting once again and avoiding eye contact. "He likes being in the loop. You wouldn't believe it but he wants all the good gossip." Jooheon shifted his eyes back to Changkyun, his stare hardening. "For real, though. How is he doing? It's hard to tell. He looked like shit but he always looks like shit. Health-wise, I mean. He's not a bad-looking kid. He's- I mean he's all right, he's-" Jooheon cut himself off, exhaling abruptly. "He looked sick. Is he okay?"

"I mean, he's eating less," Changkyun said, deciding to take the high road and not call Jooheon out on his worried rambling. "But I mean, with Wonho leaving, it's kind of expected that he'd fall apart again."

Jooheon's lips tightened into a grimace. "I heard about that, but I didn't think he'd actually...well, shit. Who's going to take care of Hyu- Skeleton now?" Jooheon asked, quickly correcting his mistake. He tried to seem unaffected, but it was clear to Changkyun how much he cared.

"Me," Changkyun answered weakly, and Jooheon's frown didn't make him feel better. "Look, you all left. I'm all that's left."

"I'm sorry," Jooheon said, the first time he'd ever said those words to Changkyun. Even when he'd punched him once, all he'd said was  _Your face looks better that way._  "You're right, we left. Can't really blame you for anything. But...can you handle it? Him, I mean? Is he going to be okay?"

Changkyun exhaled. "Yeah. He's going to be fine."

Jooheon hesitated. "And you?"

"We'll be fine," Changkyun restated, and Jooheon nodded.

"Cool, cool, cool," he mumbled, twisting the phone cord around his arm before looking up. "That's all I really have to say. Take care of our Skeleton, okay, Changkyun?"

Changkyun blinked. He wasn't sure if he'd ever heard Jooheon use his actual name. "I will."

Jooheon nodded and stood up. He hesitated a second before two words slipped past his reluctant tongue. "Thank you." Then he hung up the phone and left.

Changkyun hesitated before hanging the phone up. He understood the message.

Jooheon was leaving Hyungwon in his care. He trusted Changkyun to take care of Hyungwon.

Despite never having liked Jooheon, Changkyun found that he didn't want to fail his trust.


	55. Chapter 55

Hyungwon found life with Changkyun to be...peaceful. Changkyun didn't force him to do anything he didn't want to. He would quietly suggest that Hyungwon eat more, but he wouldn't force feed him. Changkyun even agreed to do a small workout each night. It was all Hyungwon had left of Wonho.

It was after a short exercise routine that Hyungwon fell into bed and stared at the ceiling, the covers pulled up to his neck. The fingers on his right hand ghosted by his throat, and he shivered. He knew what the night would bring. It was inevitable.

But avoiding sleep only prolonged the anxiety.

So Hyungwon closed his eyes.

***

The same scene as always. Hands around his neck, squeezing. He could feel ten distinct fingertips pressing into the soft flesh of his neck with violent intent, thumbs cutting into his throat. His exhalations came out in coughs, each one uniquely painful, his body shuddering but unable to recover from the constant pressure being applied. Coughs turned into a pitiful wheezing as the last of the oxygen filed out of his lungs. A choked gargling came out from his mouth as his vision began wavering. He knew, somewhere in the forgotten logical part of his mind, that moving would only burn his oxygen that much faster, but it was pure instinct to writhe and thrash. Anything to try and stop the inevitable.

Death.

He raised his hands up, trying to push away his attacker, whose face he had never seen, but his hands batted weakly against the air. He had no strength left, no oxygen left to burn.

This was the end.

And in his final moments, as his vision faded out, his hands fell back down to his sides, and he watched them fall, watched his palms turn towards his body, turned faintly upward in supplication, hope, prayer, before falling to his sides.

And then he died.

***

Hyungwon jerked up, his heartbeat loud in his ears. As always after resurfacing from a nightmare, he spent his first few minutes of consciousness just taking in one breath after another, trying to let himself calm down in the certainty of reality.

_There's plenty of oxygen._

_Nobody can stop you from having it._

_Take all you need._

And so he did, for a while. Just breathe. In, out. No hands on his neck trying to prevent him from doing so.

He was safe.

He was breathing.

He was alive.

He kept breathing. It was supposed to be an involuntary motion, one your body did automatically without the mind's telling it to do so, but Hyungwon didn't trust his body to handle it. He himself forced each breath in before expelling it, letting the oxygen slowly convince him of three facts.

He was safe.

He was breathing.

He was alive.

After they had begun to sink in, he moved his arms, slowly, so that his hands covered his eyes. He didn't want to think about the nightmare. He always did his best to forget them. But this nightmare hadn't been like all of the others. He'd never gotten to the part where he'd raised his arms. That was new. It was new, which meant it was important, and if it was important, then it meant it was worth the pain of remembering. Any small detail made it worth it.

Like most dreams, the details were quick to escape if not captured quickly after waking up, and Hyungwon had lost some of what had happened, but he used what he remembered to keep himself going.

The hands. He'd remembered raising them, and he mirrored his nightmare while sitting in his bed, raising his hands up like he'd seen. He closed his eyes, trying to focus, to remember what had happened. He'd...he'd tried to do something. He couldn't remember what. But the more he focused, the more it felt like he'd had this dream before, only he'd forgotten it. That happened sometimes if he went back to sleep too quickly and it all just melded together before being forgotten altogether.

But this time, he was determined to flesh it out. He needed to know why he'd seen it.

He'd put his hands out. He remembered that much. His palms had been facing away. And then...and then...

With his hands out in from of him, he tried several different actions. He tried putting them straight down, but that felt wrong. He hesitated before throwing a punch at the air, but that felt wrong too. Then, after a moment, he slowly drew his hands towards himself, and something about it seemed familiar.

He paused before tilting his hands and, feeling that it was right, he turned the palms to face himself.

He'd seen it before.

That was what had been in the nightmare.

And something else, something far more important.

He dropped his hands to his sides. They didn't matter anymore. It didn't matter how he put them down or if it was the same way as before.

Because the hands in the nightmare weren't his.

The left hand in his nightmare had had something unique, something Hyungwon had seen before, but something that he didn't have.

A scar, long and ropy, running from side to side.


	56. Chapter 56

Changkyun was shaken awake at some unclear time in the middle of the night. He'd slipped out of unconsciousness when he'd felt his bed dip as someone else sat down, but he didn't react until that same someone was leaning over him, shaking his shoulders.

"Hyungwon?" Changkyun mumbled before sitting up. His eyes were slowly adjusting, but even so, they could only make out the dark shape of Hyungwon apart from the deeper darkness surrounding them. "What's wrong? Are you okay?"

"It's not me," Hyungwon whispered urgently, his hands reaching out and patting Changkyun until he found Changkyun's shoulders once more, and he gripped them tightly with his long, bony fingers. "It's not about it. It was never about me."

"That's a really selfless thought and I'm glad you had that 2 am epiphany but-"

"I'm not the one dying," Hyungwon said, and although Changkyun couldn't physically see Hyungwon's eyes, he knew what they would look like, sad and desperate and a little bit on the edge. "It's not me. It wasn't ever me."

Changkyun sighed and reached out, smoothing Hyungwon's hair like how his mother had done for him when he was a child, weak and helpless and still convinced that the monsters were under the bed.

They weren't under the bed, they were in his head, and he knew the monsters were in Hyungwon's head too.

"Come here," Changkyun said, moving over and patting the space next to him before drawing Hyungwon closer by the arm. He kept his own arm around Hyungwon's shoulders, using it to steer Hyungwon into his side, his head resting on Changkyun's chest. "Go to sleep, Hyungwon."

"No," Hyungwon mumbled, and Changkyun felt the vibration against his rib cage. "No, you don't understand, Kihyun is-"

Changkyun sighed. He knew that Hyungwon was still struggling to accept the others' absence, but at some point, Hyungwon needed to realize that Changkyun was all he had left. "It's okay, Hyungwon. You're okay. Just close your eyes, okay? I'm not going to leave. Just go to sleep."

Hyungwon grew quiet, and after a few moments, he shifted slightly, getting more comfortable against Changkyun's side. Changkyun kept his eyes open. He'd never slept in the same bed as someone, and at the moment, he wasn't quite sure why he'd suggested it, but it had seemed like the right thing to do. But he wasn't sure how he was supposed to get comfortable with someone else's weight trapping him in, and he wasn't sure if he'd overstepped Hyungwon's boundaries by suggesting it, but...

He felt warm in a way that had been lacking for a long time. With Hyungwon's body curled up against his, he felt less alone in the darkness.

It was sort of nice.

***

"Do you remember how Kihyun got at the end?" Changkyun asked. Two weeks had passed. Some nights, Hyungwon crawled into his bed, and he made room. Some nights, nothing happened, but he couldn't help but wait in anticipation in case something did.

"Kihyun?" Jooheon asked. "What does that asshole have to do with anything?"

"Remember how he got sort of crazy obsessive? Started ranting and all that?"

"Came completely off-the-wall unhinged?" Jooheon leaned back in his chair, phone hanging lazily from his hand. "Yeah, I remember. Damn lunatic. Would have gotten us all sent to V-wing."

"Well Hyungwon's getting the same sort of way," Changkyun said, frowning. "He's always trying to talk about weird shit from his dreams, about people killing him or something. I don't know. He seems sort of obsessed, like Kihyun was. I just don't know what to do about it."

"That's normal crazy. If he gets quiet,  _then_ you know it's bad for real," Jooheon replied, rubbing at one of his eyes. "Still weird though."

"Yeah." Changkyun dropped his eyes down. He'd wanted to confide in someone else, to get answers, to get help, but there was no textbook for insanity, no how-to. "You're seeing him after me, right?"

Jooheon shook his head. "I had been planning on it, but when I got to the reception desk, Wonho was already there. And Hyungwon only gets one visitor, so I figured I'd be the nice guy for today and let Wonho take it."

"Oh," Changkyun said, surprised. "But...why didn't you just leave then? You didn't have to see me. Oh, never mind, it's about Hyungwon, right? You wanted the new intel," Changkyun quickly corrected himself, looking down once more and scuffing the toe of his shoe against the ground.

"Nah, figured I was already here. You're an okay guy to talk to," Jooheon said, and Changkyun looked up, surprised. "I mean, I like to know how Hyungwon is doing, but we never really got around to talking before all of this." Jooheon paused to rub the back of his neck, his words growing slower. "I wasn't on my meds then, so I wasn't really right in the head, but...I'm better now. I'm sorry if...Well, I'm sorry for whatever I did. Any of it. All of it."

"It's okay," Changkyun said. Partly out of instinct due to his conflict-avoidant nature, but he also meant it. He'd always thought of Jooheon as self-centered and obnoxious, always looking for the next fight, ready to rip into someone's weakness. And maybe some of that  _was_  Jooheon, the real Jooheon, but Changkyun was starting to realize that a lot of that was just Jooheon's illness. And that maybe Jooheon had felt alone until Hyungwon had come along because no one had accepted him. They had all been mildly scared of him at best, and at worse, they hadn't associated with him.

But Hyungwon had come, and somehow, he'd seen who Jooheon was inside. He didn't care about the rough exterior. He'd even put himself in harm's way just to connect with Jooheon.

And Changkyun had never taken that risk. He'd written Jooheon off, and maybe he shouldn't have.

"I wasn't fair to you," Changkyun admitted, looking away as well. Neither of them were good at any of this, feelings, emotions, relationships. "Sorry."

There was a long beat of silence.

"Shit, that got awkward," Jooheon mumbled, and Changkyun chuckled on the other end of the phone. "Well, our time's up, anyway."

"Yeah, I guess it is," Changkyun said, somewhat surprised. They hadn't used the full half hour last time. "Just letting you know, Wonho will probably be here next week," Changkyun said, looking down. "So you won't get to talk to Hyungwon."

"That's okay," Jooheon said, standing up. "There's someone else I might come and see."

Changkyun flicked his eyes up just in time to catch Jooheon's smirk before Jooheon hung up and left, flipping Changkyun the bird over his left shoulder.

Changkyun just smiled and watched his friend walk away.

His friend.

That was new.


	57. Chapter 57

"Hey," Wonho said. He didn't really know how else to start the session. He knew that Hyungwon was probably still feeling hurt and betrayed, and that was why he hadn't come for the last visitation. He'd wanted to give Hyungwon a little time to get over all of that and regain his independence.

But now Hyungwon was sitting across from him, looking quiet and anxious to leave.

"Jooheon left and you were excited when  _he_ came back to see you," Wonho blurted out, not knowing what else to say, but he knew the instant the words left his lips that it had been wrong of him.

Hyungwon's eyes hardened, and his grip on the phone tightened as he controlled his breathing with a deep inhalation. "Jooheon told us he was leaving. His dad died. He needed to go. You just-" Hyungwon's face contorted as he tried to pick a single emotion to express, but his expression kept shifting, as there were simply too many to choose from. "I left the room for half an hour, and when I got back, you were gone. There wasn't even a note." Hyungwon looked down, and Wonho felt the guilt driving toward him in waves.

"I didn't know how to tell you, Hyungwon. My mom wanted me out of the program, and I delayed it as long as I could, but...I didn't want to tell you ahead of time. I was worried that it would ruin our time together, or that you'd dislike me for leaving. Or what would have happened if I'd told you and then I  _didn't_  leave? You'd still feel betrayed in a way."

"But you didn't tell me," Hyungwon repeated softly.

Wonho closed his eyes, exhaling before opening them. "I didn't tell you. I didn't say goodbye. And I should have. I'm sorry, Hyungwon. But...I'm here now. I wanted to see you. Can't we just let things go back to how they used to be?"

Hyungwon stared at Wonho for a long moment as though formulating a response before he reached out and tapped his index finger against the glass. "You're on the wrong side, Wonho."

Wonho swallowed, trying not to frown, because he only got to spend thirty minutes every two weeks with Hyungwon, and he didn't want to waste it by having Hyungwon remember him as unhappy. "I know it's not the same, but I'm still your friend, Hyungwon." He paused. "Please."

Hyungwon frowned before crossing his legs and twisting in the chair. "What do you want to know?"

Wonho sighed in relief. "How you're doing. If you're feeling well. All of that."

Hyungwon looked down and spoke aloud in a dry tone as though reciting a script. "I'm feeling a little down but that's to be expected since I only have Changkyun for company. I'm feeling healthy enough. I could use more sleep."

"How are you  _really_?" Wonho interrupted, his eyebrows creasing, and Hyungwon stared at him for a long moment before biting his bottom lip.

"Wonho, do you believe me?"

Wonho pulled back slightly, surprised by the sudden question. "About what?"

"Do you believe me?" Hyungwon repeated, his eyes illuminated by a strange burn that hadn't been there before.

Wonho thought over his words. Did he believe Hyungwon? Did that mean in general? About everything?

Wonho wasn't really sure, but he knew that saying no would get him nowhere. "Of course I do, Hyungwon. What's wrong?"

Hyungwon's eyes shifted back and forth. "They have cameras in here," he whispered, and Wonho stared at him, confused.

"Hyungwon, what's going on?"

Hyungwon worried at his lip, sending frequent concerned glances toward the camera before meeting Wonho's eyes. "Do you believe me, Wonho?"

Wonho almost sighed in exasperation, but he held back because he knew that his poor friend wasn't quite right in the mind. He needed to be careful with him. Treat him delicately. "Yes, Hyungwon, I do," he said, but he felt something twist in his gut when he saw the intensity with which Hyungwon was eyeing him. Like his response mattered.

Wonho wasn't lying, was he?

Hyungwon leaned closer to the glass and cupped his hand around the end of the phone to muffle his voice. "It's about Kihyun," he whispered, and Wonho sighed, unable to restrain himself any longer.

He'd thought that Hyungwon had been about to tell him something big, something important, something personal. About his family, maybe, or...Wonho wasn't sure, but...he was sick and tired of hearing about Kihyun. "Again, Hyungwon? You have to get over him. I don't even remember him but he isn't worth this...obsession....of yours."

"He's dead," Hyungwon whispered, his eyes beginning to cloud with doubt and fear, but Wonho was past processing.

Wonho just shook his head before putting on a strained smile. "Maybe you should talk to Dr. Irving about getting your medication adjusted, okay?"

Hyungwon's glass clenched, and the fragility in his eyes disappeared. "You said- you said you believe me," he accused, sounding both angry and broken, a strange combination that Wonho wished he could unhear.

"But you're sick, Hyungwon. Can't you see that?" Wonho tried, but Hyungwon was shaking in his seat, his face set in a dark grimace.

"You lied," Hyungwon said, standing up out of his chair, and Wonho opened his mouth to speak, but Hyungwon didn't let him. "You told me- you said- it doesn't matter. It wasn't true. You didn't tell the truth. You don't believe me. No one believes me." He looked on the verge of tears, but his voice came out sharp and full of rage. His free hand was pulling at his hair, trying to rip it out of his scalp in his extreme frustration. "Don't do this. Don't try and talk to me. I don't want to see you."

"Hyungwon-"

"And don't tell anyone what I told you. Not that you believe it anyway. Because you don't believe me."

Wonho sank into his chair. "Hyungwon, you know that if I have reason to be concerned about your mental state, then I am obligated to report it to-"

"If you report me, then I'll end up dead too," Hyungwon said. Then he hung up the phone and left the room.

Wonho stared after him with an open mouth. After a moment, he hung up the phone and stood.

Look out for Hyungwon's mental state and tell Dr. Irving?

Or listen to Hyungwon's words and keep quiet?


	58. Chapter 58

_Tell Dr. Irving, not tell Dr. Irving, tell Dr. Irving..._

Wonho had only barely left the room, and he was already a mess, ready to rip each strand of hair out one by one. If he cared about Hyungwon, then he would protect his health and well-being by sacrificing his trust. Because as long as Hyungwon would be okay...well, that was all Wonho could ask for. And Wonho couldn't just deny the fact that Hyungwon was a patient in a metal institution. It was easily possible that Hyungwon didn't know what was best for him. It wasn't as though he were making healthy decisions in the first place.

Hyungwon should tell Dr. Irving.

He should, but...

He could just imagine the look in Hyungwon's eyes as he would be called into Dr. Irving's office, eyes of a puppy that had repeatedly kicked by the merciless foot of its owner. Wonho had already hurt Hyungwon once by leaving. Did he really want to do it again? Even  _if_  it was in Hyungwon's best interests?

"Ah, Hoseok," came a voice from down the hallway, and Wonho tensed, each of his joints tensing in resistance, but it was too late to slip away unnoticed.

Wonho turned and put on a surprised but pleasant smile. "Dr. Irving, how are you doing?"

"I'm doing well," Dr. Irving said, adjusting his glasses before smiling at Wonho and taking him in. "It's good to see you on the other side of all this. But what brings you here?"

"I, uh, just wanted to come back and see how Hyungwon is doing," Wonho said, scratching at his chin as he was still wrestling with the moral dilemma of whether of not to tell Dr. Irving what Hyungwon had told him.

"Ah, Hyungwon," Dr. Irving mused, looking down with troubled eyes. "I'm afraid that he hasn't been too stable lately."

Wonho sighed in relief. "Right, he seemed..." He trailed off, unsure exactly how to put it. It wasn't as though Hyungwon would be able to hear him, but he didn't want to say anything that would offend the taller boy.

"I can't discuss anything specific, but he seems to be receding deeper and deeper into his own unrealistic fantasies," Dr. Irving said, his mouth twisted downward at the edges in disappointment. "I'm afraid that seeing his old wing-mates might disturb him further. Maybe it's best to give him some time."

Wonho swallowed. "Um, yeah, I'll think about it."

Dr. Irving frowned, taking in Wonho's anxious stance. "Are you all right, Wonho? Did something about your visit with Hyungwon concern you?"

_Tell Dr. Irving._

_Tell him that Hyungwon has officially lost it._

_Tell him how Hyungwon is imagining full conspiracies of elaborate lies and murders that never took place._

"He...just looked a little sick," Wonho mumbled out, wincing slightly but trying to sound convincing. He wondered if he'd just damned Hyungwon to a life of insanity when he could have helped him climb out.

But Hyungwon didn't  _want_  to climb out. He was content in the darkness he'd grown to know. And was it any business of Wonho's to drag him out?

Dr. Irving nodded, his frown lined with concern. "Yes, we're monitoring how much food he takes in, but he's been a bit stubborn lately. Hopefully he'll start eating more."

"Yeah..." Wonho chuckled lightly, scratching the back of his neck and looking down slightly. "Well, um, it was nice seeing you but, but I have to, you know, get going, so..."

"Of course, of course," Dr. Irving said, nodding. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to keep you, it's just nice seeing patients who can move past their problems. Not many come back, you know." Dr. Irving grimaced toward the floor, his eyes downturned.

Wonho could imagine how difficult it was to never see the finished product of your work, to only be stuck in one phase of the operation, to only deal with the screw-ups and never get to see what they became. In a way, he felt bad for Dr. Irving, but it  _was_  his job. "It's okay, I, uh, have a nice day," Wonho stuttered out before giving a slight wave and turning toward the exit.

He couldn't help but feel that in hiding the extent of Hyungwon's insanity, he'd made a huge mistake.


	59. Chapter 59

"Shhh," Changkyun murmured, smoothing Hyungwon's and pushing the errant strands off his forehead. "Calm down, okay? I'm here. Just breathe."

Hyungwon's eyes were wide, his words incoherent as he rambled, having awoken straight out a nightmare, and each syllable was smashed into the next. This had become a common middle-of-the-night occurrence, and Changkyun was used to understanding little to none of what Hyungwon said.

It didn't bother him as long as he didn't consider Hyungwon to be in his right mind. Instead, he thought of Hyungwon as someone who was sick, someone who needed to be taken care of. He didn't have medicine or shots, so all he could really offer was comfort, and he did his best.

Because Hyungwon was sick.

Because Hyungwon was insane.

And babbling incoherently was just part of all that. Changkyun had gotten used to tuning it out, because he considered it as part of the illness, not part of Hyungwon.

Because his attacks had been happening near every night now, Hyungwon had taken to sleeping in Changkyun's bed after some initial reluctance. But Changkyun had reassured him time after time that it was fine, that it wasn't weird, that it was okay if that was what would make him feel okay.

So Changkyun would often be woken up in the middle of the night, if he'd found sleep at all, by Hyungwon rocking back and forth, his knees pulled up to his chest and his hands ripping at his hair, and it would be Changkyun's job to rub his back, pull his hands away, hold them together in his and rock Hyungwon against him. Then he'd wait for Hyungwon's frantic mutterings to grow quiet to the point that Changkyun could no longer hear him. He'd then slide his hands under Hyungwon's knees, going slowly to make sure that Hyungwon was okay with him doing so, and unfurl his legs so they were no longer crunched up. He'd lie Hyungwon down, make sure the taller boy was comfortable, before fixing Hyungwon up a bit, pushing his hair out of his face, straightening his shirt, those kinds of things.

It made Changkyun feel like Hyungwon's mother in a weird way, but wasn't that what a mother was, a caretaker? Only being a caretaker for Hyungwon meant that being equals, that just being  _friends_ , wasn't really possible. Of course Changkyun enjoyed the other's presence, and of course he considered them to be friends in a way, but it was impossible to do things that friends do when he was more focused on making sure Hyungwon ate and that he felt okay and that he wasn't about to have a mental breakdown.

Usually, after Changkyun laid Hyungwon down, the older boy went silent and eventually fell back asleep, but this time was different.

"He didn't believe me," Hyungwon said, his voice sounding desperate and lonely in the dark. Betrayed.

Changkyun just keep smoothing Hyungwon's hair down. Sometimes, when Hyungwon talked, the words sounded like they made sense and like he was talking about something real, but more often than not, Changkyun suspected that it was all rubbish, just random strings of words in random places that happened to make logical sense by coincidence on occasion.

So he didn't really take Hyungwon seriously.

Because it wasn't Hyungwon talking, it was the illness.

But then that changed.

"Wonho doesn't believe me. I know you don't believe me and that's okay but Wonho doesn't believe me and he said he would," Hyungwon continued, sniffling softly, and Changkyun felt his muscles tense. He didn't know what to say. "Nobody believes me," Hyungwon repeated. "Can't you believe me? No, you can't, you can't believe me..." Hyungwon trailed off, answering his own question.

Changkyun sighed. He was torn between caretaker and friend. As a caretaker, he should just try to get Hyungwon back to sleep, knowing that all of his incessant ranting was bullshit anyway, but as a friend...

"Tell me," Changkyun said with some reluctance. "Tell me what I'm supposed to believe."


	60. Chapter 60

"Cool so Hyungwon doesn't want to talk with you because you ruined his life and he hates you," Changkyun said casually, looking down at his fingernails and thinking about how he needed to teach his cuticles a lesson before looking up at Wonho. "Maybe that was too harsh. Let's say...you betrayed him by leaving, came back to haunt him like some fricking ghost and betrayed him again by lying to him and getting his little hopes up, and now he doesn't want to see you because you crushed his little heart. Does that sound about right?"

"Look," Wonho pleaded, trying not to let Changkyun's words affect him, but he couldn't actually deny anything he'd said. "I get why he doesn't want to talk with me, but...you know how he's been," Wonho said, his voice taking on a slightly whiny tone. "You've heard what he's been saying. It's just crazy talk."

"So, that's the thing," Changkyun said, kicking back his chair slightly. He'd seen Jooheon do it, and it looked fun. And cool. But mostly fun. "I chatted with Hyungwon about it, and don't get me wrong, I still think he's crazy, but that doesn't mean he's wrong."

Wonho blinked. "You're kidding me, right? About the whole murder conspiracy? You really believe him?"

Changkyun rested the front legs of the chair back on the ground, growing more serious. "Hyungwon hasn't asked anything of me, ever. Except once. To believe him. Do I still think he's very sick and needs help? Yeah. But did I finally listen to him and hear out what he's trying to say?" Changkyun let his silence answer the question.

"So what is he saying now?" Wonho asked, crossing his arms, which didn't look as cool when one of his hands was busy holding a phone.

"Someone murdered Kihyun," Changkyun said.

Wonho raised an eyebrow.

"Look, how we know this doesn't matter. But think about it, okay? What wing did Kihyun say he was getting transferred to?"

Wonho stared back blankly.

"Right, you don't remember anything," Changkyun said before filling in the blanks himself. "He said he was getting transferred to A-wing. Which makes sense. The higher the letter, the more privileges. He was excited to leave. Said there'd be no cameras. Thought it would make him feel relaxed. Only..."

"Only?" Wonho repeated, unable to help himself from being drawn in.

Changkyun's mouth twitched. "Only as far as Hyungwon can tell, there are only 25 wings."

"And how'd he figure that out?" Wonho asked, not believing Changkyun but going along with it anyway.

"The cafeteria, mostly. Only 25 tables, none of them with an A. And have you ever seen anyone from A-wing?"

Wonho snorted. "That doesn't prove anything. You're wasting my-"

"I'm not," Changkyun said, his voice insistent as it cut through Wonho's. "Look, there's...other stuff. Stuff I can't explain, not here. But you need to get us out of here, Wonho."

Wonho blinked. "Get you guys out? What do you mean?"

"I mean that Hyungwon knows that somebody killed Kihyun, only we don't know who, and honestly, I'm afraid they're going to take Hyungwon next."

"But why Hyungw-"

"I don't have time to explain everything, okay? Just trust me."

Wonho stared across the glass at Changkyun, and Changkyun's eyes flashed as he realized what he'd said.

"So this is how it must have felt for Hyungwon," he murmured. "Every time he asked me to believe him, and he saw me looking back at him, thinking he was crazy."

"I don't think you're-"

"And lying," Changkyun interrupted. "I lied to him. Told him whatever he needed to hear to make him at peace. Don't lie to me, Wonho. I'd do this without your help, but to pass two evaluations, it would take two weeks, and then since we're minors, we'd have to get approval from our guardians. We don't have that kind of time, Wonho. Are you in or what?"

Wonho stared back into Changkyun's eyes. He knew that Changkyun was a patient here too. Chances were, his medication was off or he'd fallen off the deep end for good. The best way out of this was to tell Changkyun he was in, and then go tell Dr. Irving that both Changkyun and Hyungwon needed severe help.

But he read Changkyun's eyes, saw the desperation hiding behind forced calm, knew that Changkyun understood that Wonho could rat him out.

He thought of Hyungwon's eyes, full of a bit of craziness sure, but equally desperate if not more so, begging for someone to listen.

And he hadn't. Not before. He hadn't listened, and now Hyungwon wouldn't even talk to him.

He wanted to hear Hyungwon's voice again.

"Okay," Wonho said, grimacing at the figure across the glass, who exhaled in barely-restrained relief. "I'm in."


	61. Chapter 61

"Great, great," Changkyun replied, leaning back in his chair. "So, what's the plan?"

"Plan?" Wonho's eyes bugged out. "I thought  _you_  had a plan!"

"No, you're the outside help so you're the one who has to make the plan," Changkyun said, nodding firmly.

"I don't..." Wonho trailed off as his eyes shifted from Changkyun to the ward guard in the back of the room. He ran through several trains of thought for a few moments before nodding, more to himself than to Changkyun. "I might have something. But I need to ask you a few things first."

***

Wonho slipped inside the door marked STAFF ONLY in white stenciled letters and hoped that he'd followed the right person.

A boy not much older than himself, mid-twenties perhaps, looked over without interest before doing a double-take. "You're not staff," he said before getting to his feet with a small frown. "I'm sorry, but you're not supposed to be in here. If you're lost, I can help you find-"

"I'm not lost. I needed to talk to you," Wonho said, shutting the door behind him and hesitating before flipping the lock and turning back to face the ward guard, who watched him with wary eyes.

"You were visiting a patient earlier today," the boy said, his eyes flickering with recognition as he continued trying to place Wonho. "You were a patient here, weren't you? In M-wing."

Wonho nodded his head, trying to speed the whole thing up since he didn't know how much time he had. He'd been running on luck so far, and he was praying it didn't run out any time soon. "Right. I used to be a patient here. I'm Shin Hoseok from M-wing," Wonho quickly introduced before pausing and licking his bottom lip out of nervousness. "And you're the guard who was assigned to us on visitation days."

The boy looked surprised that Wonho had recognized him, but he nodded a moment later. "But you completed the program. Why are you here?" He paused, reflecting back on what he already knew. "You were visiting one of your wingmates, right? But what do you need me for?"

"You were with each of us every other Friday, right?" Wonho waited for a nod before continuing. "So you know who I am, and you know who Changkyun - the boy from earlier - is."

The boy nodded. "Yes. I mean, I don't remember very many names - there are a lot of patients here, and people are always coming and going." He shifted uncomfortably. "So?"

"Do you remember Chae Hyungwon?"

The boy froze before shifting once more, his eyes tracing along the wall away from Wonho. "The name sounds familiar."

"He's in M-wing. He's tall, pale, and he usually looks pretty tired. He's still there. Just him and Changkyun now. So do you know him?"

The boy pursed his lips before sighing as he placed his elbows on his knees, leaning forward in his seat. "Yes, I know Hyungwon. Chae Hyungwon, I mean. I know of him."

"What do you know about him?" Wonho asked, narrowing his eyes at the boy. He had information that Wonho suddenly wanted. "Why is he important to you? You said it yourself, there are lots of patients coming and going. So why do you remember Hyungwon?"

The boy exhaled, looking up at Wonho with tired eyes. "I just- I felt bad for him. That's kind of normal for this job. You're just supposed to escort patients and provide support if anything gets out of hand. You're not supposed to get attached or form relationships or anything like that. There's just too many kids with sob stories here to worry about every single one of them."

"But Hyungwon?" Wonho prompted.

The boy ran a hand through his hair, his stress evident in the slight shaking of his hand. "He just...he's never caused trouble. He does what people tell him to do. But sometimes, he just looks like he's dying on the inside. And a lot of the kids here, they're angry, they're in pain and they want to take it out on everyone else. They think it's unfair, that the world is against them. But Hyungwon never complains. He's always been sort of quiet like that. And, his parents...look," the boy said, sitting up with a frown on his face. "I try not to eavesdrop. Visitation sessions should be private for the patient and their guests. But sometimes it's hard not to listen in. And even when I couldn't hear what his parents were telling him, I could read them pretty clear. They were always just lecturing Hyungwon, the mom mainly, and maybe lecturing isn't the right word, but...I just had to watch as Hyungwon became a little smaller, sank down a little more. And then there was the time that he picked up the phone and just set it on the ledge so he didn't have to hear them. I just...I felt bad for him."

"But you said that everyone has a sob story. How is Hyungwon different?" Wonho repeated. He knew he was wasting time, but he wanted to know.

The boy threw his hands up in exasperation. "I don't know. Every now and then, there's just a kid that gets to me. Maybe they just don't seem that much different from myself. I don't know. I just felt bad, okay? He seemed like a good kid. Why does it even matter?"

Wonho opened his mouth before licking his lips once more and rushing onward. "Look, I can't tell you all the details, but Hyungwon's life is in danger, okay? I need to get him out, and you're the only person I could think of who might be able to help."

The boy stared at Wonho like he was insane. Which he wasn't supposed to be, since he was on the outside now, but still. "Break him out? Of a mental institution? That's...well, that's insane. And why me? What made you even think that I could help?"

"Because you've been M-wing's visitation guard for months. You're not one of us, but you know us, to some degree. You have access to the rooms, to the classroom, to the exits." Wonho paused, his heart rate escalating. "Look. You have no reason to believe me or trust me. I know that. I know I seem crazy, and I know how it looks that I used to be a patient. But if Hyungwon doesn't get out, he's going to die."

The boy paled, tapping his right index finger against his thigh. "But...can't he just pass his evaluations? He could be out in just two wee-"

"Two weeks is too long," Wonho interrupted. "And...I don't think he can pass an evaluation. He's failed every one. I'm not saying that Hyungwon is in a mentally stable place and that he deserves to leave the program the fair way by getting better. Truth is, he isn't getting better, and he probably isn't going to. But a sick Hyungwon is better than a dead Hyungwon, right?"

The boy met Wonho's eyes but didn't open his mouth. His eyes held Wonho's while he thought, and just as he opened his mouth, a sound from behind Wonho startled him.

He turned to see the doorknob turning.


	62. Chapter 62

The doorknob stopped, stuck by the lock, and Wonho looked back over at the boy, who hesitated before waving his arms at Wonho, gesturing for him to crawl beneath the table.

Wonho hurriedly knelt and crawled beneath the table, letting the tablecloth fall back down to hide him. Then the boy flicked the lock and opened the door.

"What the hell did you lock it for?" came an unfamiliar voice, followed by a short chuckle from the boy.

"Sorry, my mind must have been on autopilot. Come on in."

"I'm not staying long, just grabbing my lunch from the fridge." There were footsteps, followed by shuffling, followed by the sound of the refrigerator door being yanked open. Then more footsteps, a few murmurs, and then the sound of the door opening and shutting.

A pause.

"You can come out now," the boy said, and Wonho cautiously crawled out from under the table, stopping as he saw an upturned hand in his field of vision, and his eyes traced up the arm to find the boy looking down at him with unreadable eyes.

Wonho took the hand, standing up and nodding. "Thanks," he said before looking back over at the boy. When the boy said nothing, Wonho sighed. "I'm sorry. I knew you wouldn't just believe some kid but I thought I needed to try-"

"Tomorrow," the boy interrupted. "I need to get word to Hyungwon about this."

"Could you tell Changkyun?" Wonho asked, scratching his chin and wincing slightly. "Hyungwon trusts him the most right now. And I was thinking maybe we could pull a two-for-one. Get them both out. Changkyun is good at taking care of Hyungwon, and we need him to stick around." Wonho decided it best to leave out the part about Hyungwon hating him right now.

The boy sighed. "Fine. I'll try. But don't get me wrong, I'm not doing this for you, I'm doing it for Hyungwon." He paused. "I don't think he'll ever get out out of here on his own. He hasn't been getting better, he's been getting worse. I don't think whatever they're doing is working."

"It's not," Wonho quickly agreed. "But we can help him."

"We?" the boy asked, sensing that Wonho wasn't talking about him. "You're not taking him back to his family, are you?"

"No. Well...not that family," Wonho said, looking down at his fingers as they curled into his palms. "They can't help him either."

"Then who?"

Wonho's lips curled upward at the edges. "Our family. M-wing."

The boy was quiet before he nodded. "Not every wing is that close once they're out. Most kids never look back."

"Hyungwon changed that for all of us," Wonho said, looking at the door. He wished he could see Hyungwon, talk to him, tell him that he was here and that he hadn't abandoned him or betrayed him.

 _Tomorrow_ , he told himself.  _I can tell him tomorrow. And if this goes according to plan, hopefully I won't have to say anything at all. Hopefully he'll just know._

_If it goes according to plan._

_If._


	63. Chapter 63

Changkyun spent the rest of the day following his conversation with the ward guard debating whether or not to tell Hyungwon what was going to happen. On one hand, he might want to prepare, pack something, Changkyun didn't know. But it could also stress Hyungwon out, and if they failed...it could make it even worse for him.

So Changkyun kept quiet that night, and it wasn't until the next morning that everything changed.

***

Changkyun woke up early and turned his head to look down at the figure lying to his left. Hyungwon was taller and skinnier than Changkyun, but he slept in angles, with his knees and arms bent, so he looked smaller than he was. There was something sad about it, but Changkyun couldn't define it exactly. Just that Hyungwon slept like he wanted to disappear. Changkyun didn't want Hyungwon to disappear. That's why he had to get him out.

He sat up so the thin blanket pooled around his waist. He'd used to sleep shirtless, but he'd sensed that it had made Hyungwon uncomfortable, and now that Hyungwon was sleeping more in Changkyun's bed than his own, Changkyun had decided to sleep in the itchy cotton cloth.

"Hyungwon," he murmured before shaking Hyungwon's shoulder. The older boy's face scrunched up a bit before his eyes fluttered open and he drew his limbs in even closer, forming a compact ball.

"Kyun?" Hyungwon whispered, tired and confused. Changkyun had never woken him up early before; they'd always waited for the first alarm to sound. Hyungwon put a hand on Changkyun's arm. "What's wrong?" he asked. He didn't mean to whisper, but his voice came out naturally soft.

"Nothing's wrong," Changkyun said, giving Hyungwon a small smile. He liked the nickname. He felt like he'd been competing with the others, namely Wonho, for Hyungwon's attention this whole time, and it seemed as though he'd finally gotten it. By process of elimination, sure, but he was okay with that.

"You're being strange," Hyungwon said, his eyes clouded with worry as they scanned Changkyun's. He shifted, holding himself up with his right arm so he could see Changkyun eye-to-eye. He pursed his lips before holding the back of his left hand against Changkyun's forehead.

"I'm not sick," Changkyun said with a laugh, pulling back from Hyungwon, who let his hand drop with a slight frown. "But thank you for your concern," Changkyun quickly added, not wanting Hyungwon to feel bad or like Changkyun was laughing at him. In truth, he was just happy that Hyungwon cared. Nobody had cared about Changkyun in a long time. Not really. His mom, sure, but he was always just at the bottom of her to-do list. Hyungwon never made him feel like he was just an item to be checked off.

And Changkyun never wanted Hyungwon to feel that way, either.

"We should change," Hyungwon said, already starting to push himself up, but Changkyun put a hand on his shoulder.

"Let's...let's stay like this. Just for a little bit longer, okay?" Changkyun didn't want this moment to leave so quickly.

Hyungwon stared at him for a second before letting himself flop back onto Changkyun's bed. "Why'd you wake us up early if we were just going to sit here," he mumbled to himself, and Changkyun ruffled his hair. Hyungwon half-heartedly tried to move his head, but Changkyun knew he didn't really mind altogether that much.

"Just cause I felt like it," Changkyun said. It was somewhat true. He just didn't want their last memory of this place to begin with a harsh alarm.

"You're crazy," Hyungwon said, and Changkyun laughed, looking down to spot a smile on Hyungwon's lips before he turned his face away.

Changkyun mentally saved the image as a good memory.


	64. Chapter 64

They both got up a few minutes later, and Hyungwon went back to his side of the room to change. Changkyun looked away, slipping on his own uniform, as he knew that Hyungwon was shy about things like that.

"Are you ready?" Changkyun asked, trying to ignore the nervous beating of his heart. Today was the day they'd finally leave behind this place. He wasn't sure if he was excited or scared.

"Yeah," Hyungwon answered a moment later, turning to face Changkyun, who smiled at the taller boy and nodded to the door.

"Let's go then," he said, and Hyungwon just nodded, following a step behind him, always close to his back as though he didn't want to fall behind or get lost.

They left the room and began walking down the hallway. The guard Changkyun had spoken to yesterday appeared at the intersection, waiting for them. Normally, they'd take a left and head to the cafeteria for breakfast, but Changkyun knew that they'd be taking a right today and leaving everything behind.

But Hyungwon didn't yet know that.

They came to the end of the hallway, and Changkyun started walking to the right, following the guard, and he heard Hyungwon take two steps and stop.

Changkyun turned, looking over his shoulder before facing him. "Hyungwon, this way."

"But..." Hyungwon frowned, his face creased in confusion. "But we usually go that way..."

"I know," Changkyun said gently. "But not today, all right?"

"But..."

Changkyun bit his bottom lip before exhaling. "Hyungwon. You asked me to believe in you, right?"

Hyungwon gave a jerky nod.

"Now I'm asking you to believe in me."

Hyungwon's expression grew even more conflicted than before, but he gave another small nod and took several hesitant steps toward Changkyun.

"Thank you, Hyungwon," Changkyun said, his voice soft, and as Hyungwon approached him, Changkyun took his hand. Then he looked back to the guard who was waiting in silence, and Changkyun nodded. "We're ready," he said, squeezing Hyungwon's hand. Hyungwon didn't squeeze back, but that was okay.

The guard nodded and turned, resuming their previous path, and Changkyun led Hyungwon out of the darkness.

***

"I hid a change of clothes for each of you in the nearest bathroom. It's the first door in the hallway to the right," the guard said, addressing Changkyun because Hyungwon had become more or less unresponsive in his state of absolute confusion. He'd grown used to a routine, and now they were interrupting the routine, and he hadn't yet adjusted.

"Someone will be waiting for you in the lobby to give you transportation," the guard continued before pausing. "I don't have any money I can give you. And I only had one jacket. I'm sorry-"

"Thank you," Changkyun said, bowing to the guard. "You have no idea how much this means to us."

The older boy looked caught off guard. "Just-" He sent a short glance toward Hyungwon before looking back at Changkyun. "Take care of yourselves."

"You too," Changkyun said. He'd been so grateful to get out before that he hadn't stopped to worry about the consequences the guard might face. But he'd also helped them knowing that he could lose his job, and Changkyun was determined to make purpose of his actions. "I hope we get the chance to thank you in the future."

The boy gave a sad smile as though he knew that they'd never meet again. "I hope you both find the peace you've been waiting for."

Changkyun nodded and tugged Hyungwon forward until he saw the bathroom the guard had mentioned. He slipped inside, Hyungwon following him by way of their connected hands, and Changkyun immediately turned and locked the door after them. He turned and scanned the room before spotting a bag full of clothes in the windowsill. Without letting go of Hyungwon's hand, he grabbed the bag and began pulling out clothes: two shirts, two pants, one jacket. They'd have to make do with the socks and shoes they were already wearing.

Changkyun turned to Hyungwon, taking his other hand in his own. "Listen. We need to change, and then we're going to leave. Okay?" He paused, his eyes flicking back and forth between Hyungwon's left and right eyes, scanning to see if Hyungwon had processed his statement. It was too hard for him to come to a conclusive answer. "I know you're confused and maybe a little scared, but I just need you to trust me. I won't leave you, okay? I'm going to take care of you. But right now, I need you to change into these clothes, okay?"

Changkyun let go of one of Hyungwon's hands to grab a pair of pants and a shirt. He held them out to Hyungwon and waited.

A few moments later, Hyungwon reached out, his hand shaking, and he took the clothing from Changkyun. Then he paused before letting go of Changkyun's other hand and turning around so his back faced Changkyun.

Changkyun waited just long enough to ensure that Hyungwon had actually started changing before he himself began tossing off and throwing on clothing. Once finished, he waited until the shuffling from the other side of the room went quiet before he turned and looked Hyungwon up and down.

The taller boy was dressed in simple black long sleeve shirt and ripped jeans. The jeans were a little short and the shirt a little loose, but he looked like...well, not a mental patient, which would hopefully be enough to get them out without raising suspicion.

Changkyun himself was wearing a white t-shirt with faded letters spelling out a band name and a pair of jeans that fit him surprisingly well. He looked over to see the jacket lying on the counter, and he grabbed it, sliding Hyungwon's arms into the sleeves.

"Are you ready?" he asked after a moment.

There was a long moment of silence during which Changkyun was afraid that Hyungwon would break down, but then Hyungwon nodded, and Changkyun knew it would all be okay.

"Let's go," Hyungwon whispered, slipping his hand back into Changkyun's. "Someone's waiting for us."


	65. Chapter 65

Changkyun led Hyungwon to the lobby, having left their uniforms balled up in the trash. He scanned the lobby before spotting a familiar figure and walking over.

"We're ready. Let's get out of here," Changkyun whispered, and Wonho looked up from under the brim of his hat, lowering the newspaper he'd been reading. He tried to make eye contact with Hyungwon, who was having none of it, and instead sighed, looking back to Changkyun. "All right. My mom's car is in the lot."

He stood up, and Changkyun continued to tug Hyungwon on forward, holding his breath as they passed the receptionist, and then they were out the front doors.

Wonho began walking to the car, but Changkyun stopped, Hyungwon stopped just behind him.

Wonho realized that he was walking by himself and he turned, frowning. "Hey, we need to..." He trailed off as he took in the scene before him: Changkyun and Hyungwon, taking in the first natural sunlight they'd felt in months, since they'd been admitted to the program.

He waited until Changkyun seemed to startle as though remembering where he was, and then he gave a small tug on Hyungwon's hand, and the two began slowly making their way over to Wonho. He waited for them to get closer before he turned and led the others to the car he'd borrowed (basically stolen) from his mother. He double-clicked the unlock icon on the key fob, and there was a soft  _snick_  from inside as the locks popped.

He turned to face them. "Who wants shotgun?" he asked with a chuckle, trying to lighten the mood, but Changkyun just looked over at Hyungwon. They said something with their eyes in a language that Wonho wasn't privy too, and then Changkyun looked at Wonho before nodding toward the backseat door.

"We'll just sit in the back," he said, and Wonho scratched his chin before nodding. Changkyun opened the door and motioned for Hyungwon to slide in, momentarily letting go of the other's hand as he turned to face Wonho once they were alone. "Where are we going to stay?" Changkyun asked, only now able to give voice to his worry. He hadn't wanted Hyungwon to see it, but he didn't know what their future held. They had no belongings, no money, nowhere to go. Changkyun could try reasoning with his mother, sure, but she'd likely make up excuses involving her boyfriend or throw him back into the program. He couldn't risk that, couldn't risk abandoning Hyungwon like everyone else had.

"Don't worry," Wonho said, but Changkyun wasn't at all reassured. "I talked to someone about it. I think you're going to like it just fine."

Changkyun's mouth twitched in doubt, but he nodded and got into the car. Wonho closed the door for him before hopping in the driver's seat.

As he pulled out of the lot and began driving, he kept an ear to the back, listening to see if they'd start talking about anything, but they were both silent. When he glanced up at the rear view mirror, he saw Hyungwon to his right, staring out the window with an unreadable expression, and Changkyun seated directly behind him, also looking out the window. And yet their hands were still attached, hanging limply in the empty middle seat as though they couldn't bear to be separated by the small distance of several feet.

There was a small ache in his heart knowing that he'd had a friendship like that with Hyungwon at some time, a friendship he had given up. But he knew now that if he would have stayed, he wouldn't have been able to help them escape, and maybe that was worth it. He didn't need Hyungwon to like him, as long as Hyungwon was safe.

***

Wonho pulled into a small parking lot adjacent to an apartment complex and put the car in park before turning around to face his passengers. "We're here. Are you guys ready?"

Hyungwon looked over at Changkyun, who nodded at Wonho. "Yeah. But where is  _here_?"

"You'll see," Wonho said, getting out of the car and slipping his keys into his pocket. A moment later, the back door opened, and Changkyun slid out, Hyungwon following him. It kind of bothered Wonho how codependent Hyungwon seemed to be, but it wasn't the right time to say anything. Instead, he locked the car and led them up the stairs to the third floor.

"Give me a second," he muttered, pulling out a crinkled piece of paper from his pocket. "306," he read aloud before making his way down the hall to a door engraved with the number 306. He gave the two a tight smile before knocking on the door, three sharp raps.

The door swung open almost immediately. "Holy shit, Wonho. I expected you here half an hour ago. You've gotta be the slowest frickin driver in the country. And before you give me that bullshit about it being your mom's car-" The boy cut off before waving a hand dismissively. "I'll yell at you later." He turned to face the two escapees. "Damn, you two look even more pale in the sun."

"Living inside for months does that to you," Changkyun accepted, rolling his eyes. "Are you going to let us in or what?"

"Fine, fine." The boy pushed Wonho in but stopped Hyungwon. "Good to see you, Skeleton," he said, his face showing a bit of sadness as he took in Hyungwon's crumbling mental state.

Hyungwon looked up, and the worry on his face slowly melted into a smile.


	66. Chapter 66

Hyungwon and Changkyun took the couch, or more accurately, were pushed toward the couch by Jooheon, who turned out to be a firm but generous host. He himself took a seat cross-legged on the floor, and Wonho hesitated before sitting down next to him with his knees drawn to his chest.

"So, how does freedom feel?" Jooheon joked, and Changkyun smiled.

"I thought you were supposed to get nicer after you started taking your medication," he replied, and Jooheon's eyebrow arched upward.

"I  _am_  being nice! Besides, it just makes me want to punch people a little bit less. I'm still the same asshole I always was."

"Good, good," Changkyun said, reassured. Hyungwon smiled a tiny bit.

"So did you guys want to get settled in or get straight to it?" Jooheon continued.

Changkyun looked over at Hyungwon, whose smile was fading all too quickly. He looked back at Jooheon. "Does he have to-"

"He's kind of in the middle of all this," Jooheon said bluntly. "If what Hyungwon told you told Wonho told me is true, then we don't have time to sugar coat the whole thing."

"Kihyun is dead," Hyungwon spoke up, and they all turned to stare at him. "He is. I know it."

Jooheon was quiet for a moment before he leaned back, exhaling loudly. "That's what Wonho told me. So I got Kihyun's mom's contact information, and I called her yesterday."

Wonho snapped his head toward Jooheon. "And? What did she say?"

Jooheon pursed his lips. "Nothing conclusive. She hasn't visited him, but she didn't do that anyway."

"Oh." Wonho sank down.

"But I tried to visit him," Jooheon went on, and Wonho sat up straight once more. "They wouldn't let me."

"Do visitors not have access to A-wing or something?" Wonho asked, frowning.

Jooheon shook his head, frowning. "That wasn't it. They said that he was no longer a patient there, that he'd left the program."

Changkyun swallowed and opened his mouth, but Wonho stood up abruptly and pulled Jooheon out of the room before Changkyun could ask him anything.

***

"What the hell was that for?" Jooheon asked, scowling at Wonho, who had shut the door to Jooheon's bedroom to keep their conversation private.

"Look, you can't say stuff like that in front of Hyungwon," Wonho said, giving Jooheon a look, who glared back.

"Why the hell not?"

"Because then he'll actually start thinking it's real," Wonho continued. "If we act like we believe it, then he's going to believe it even more. Just tell him that he's wrong, that Kihyun is having a good old time in A-wing. Honestly, it's probably true. The desk worker was probably mistaken. Or maybe Kihyun up and left the program without telling his mom. That's possible too. Basically anything is possible besides Kihyun being dead."

Jooheon just shook his head. "I can't believe you're telling me to lie to him."

"It's better for him," Wonho said, nodding to himself while scanning Jooheon's eyes. "We can't just perpetuate this delusion. You saw how he is. He's fragile, Jooheon."

"Who's fault is that?" Jooheon snarled, curling his lip at Wonho. "Getting all buddy-buddy with him and then leaving out of nowhere. Yeah, I heard about that."

Wonho frowned. "It wasn't like that. I had to go, okay? And Changkyun-"

"Is doing his best, but that's a lot of responsibility to place on him," Jooheon interrupted. "And Hyungwon is stronger than you give him credit for. I can see it. You've just blinded yourself to that part of him. So no, I'm not going to give him bullshit or lie to him."

"Why not?" Wonho asked, clenching his jaw but ignoring the jabs against himself.

"Because I think I believe him."


	67. Chapter 67

Jooheon left Wonho, going back into the living room and leaving Wonho to process for himself.

It wasn't that Wonho was against Hyungwon. He really did want the best for his friend. But he wanted to help him get better, and from what he'd seen, Hyungwon's... _obsession_...with the whole Kihyun conspiracy was only worsening his condition.

He wanted to help Hyungwon, he really did. Why couldn't anyone else see that?

***

"So, can you tell us why you think Kihyun is dead?" Jooheon asked as he sat back down, facing Hyungwon and trying not to let his anger at Wonho spill over to the tall boy.

Changkyun gave Hyungwon's hand a squeeze, and Hyungwon tensed before nodding. "Kihyun...he told me...he told me that they were transferring him to A-wing. But there is no A-wing."

"How do you know that?" Jooheon asked. He'd heard brief details from Wonho, but he was still fairly out of the loop.

"The cafeteria. It's missing a table. There's no A. And we've never seen anyone from A-wing. It doesn't exist."

Jooheon nodded slowly, not entirely convinced. "Okay. But how do you know that he's actually  _dead_?"

"Because I saw it."

Jooheon froze. "I'm sorry,  _what_? You  _saw_  Kihyun die? Why didn't you lead with that?"

Hyungwon fell silent, and Changkyun nudged his shoulder. "Tell him about your nightmares," he said in a low voice, and Jooheon raised an eyebrow as Hyungwon frowned and shook his head.

"Hey," Jooheon said, trying to make his voice sound somewhat gentler, a tone he wasn't really used to. "I'm not here to judge you, Hyungwon. But if Kihyun's really dead like you're saying, well...I don't know what we're supposed to do, but...that's serious. I just want to know how  _you_ know, okay?"

"You can tell him," Changkyun insisted, and Hyungwon exhaled, keeping his eyes on the ground.

"Every night...sometimes not every night... _most_  nights...I...I see someone, only I don't see their face, and they're...they're choking me, trying to kill me, and I can't...I can't breathe, and I know I'm going to die, and then I wake up," Hyungwon mumbled, not looking up. His eyes traced the carpet, following every thread, afraid to look up and see the look in Jooheon's eyes that he'd seen in so many others. "And I thought...all this time, I thought it was me, I thought they were going to kill me and I was going to die, only I didn't know when or where or who it was but I knew it was going to happen, only..."

Hyungwon flinched as he remembered the first time his dream had changed, when he'd held up his hands to see that they had never been his hands at all. "Only it wasn't me, it was Kihyun, it was always Kihyun, it was him that they were killing."

The room was quiet. Then Jooheon spoke up, trying to find a question that wouldn't make Hyungwon feel as though they didn't believe him. "How did you know it was Kihyun?"

"His hand," Hyungwon whispered, turning his left palm so it stared up at him, angry, accusatory, smooth and unmarked. "He has a scar. And in my dream, I held up my hand, only it was  _his_  hand, with his scar, and that's when I knew that it was Kihyun and not me. It was Kihyun," he repeated, his voice sad and low.

"How do you know that he's already dead though?" Jooheon asked, frowning. If he were to be honest with himself, he felt somewhat disturbed, a bit shaken. When Hyungwon spoke, he spoke with a ring of inevitable truth in his voice, a truth he'd been living with for a long time. "I mean, what if it hasn't happened yet? What if it's going to happen in the future?"

And Jooheon, who had already found himself believing his thin friend, asked himself the question that confirmed his faith in Hyungwon.  _If Kihyun is still alive, can we save him?_

"He's dead," Hyungwon said, his voice firm. "The dream changed. I didn't know...I didn't know that it was Kihyun, then. I could have...could have saved him, maybe...but he's dead now. The dream wouldn't have shown me his hand unless something changed. We can't save him anymore. That's what the hand means. It gave me the answer to a question that had become useless. All this time..." His voice grew raw, desperate. "All this time, it was him."

"How long..." Jooheon paused. He didn't like seeing Hyungwon like this, broken and in agony from holding a secret that was ripping him apart from within. "How long have you been having these dreams?"

Hyungwon looked up at last, his eyes dark with hopelessness. "The dream changed a while ago. Maybe two weeks. I don't know. Days flow together. But...I've had them for a while." He paused. "Two years, maybe. Before I even knew Kihyun."

"Two years..." Jooheon mused aloud, his eyes clouded with worry. "Is that why..."

Hyungwon nodded, averting his eyes to the right. He picked at the corner of the sofa. "That's why my mom put me in the program. The first night I had that dream, I thought it was just a nightmare. But then it happened the next night, and the next night...So after a week or two, I told her about it. She said it was nothing. But the dreams kept happening, and I brought them up again, and she...she got mad at me for bringing it up, said I was trying to humiliate her. But they just kept happening, and I didn't know who else to turn to except my family, and when she heard me talking to my brother about it, she said I was trying to corrupt him too, and eventually she got sick of it, sick of  _me_ , so...so she dropped me off."

"But..." Jooheon blinked as he realized something.

They'd all joined the program because they'd had mental issues.

But Hyungwon...

If he was right about Kihyun...

Then Hyungwon had never been crazy at all.


	68. Chapter 68

"It's okay," Changkyun insisted as Hyungwon stared at himself in the mirror in despair. Hyungwon had fled to the bathroom on the verge of a mental breakdown after telling Jooheon about his dreams, and Changkyun had of course followed him, wanting to make sure that the taller boy didn't accidentally hurt himself or fill his own head with negative thoughts.

Changkyun looked into the mirror and wasn't sure what Hyungwon was seeing, but Changkyun saw Hyungwon: a kind, caring boy who tended to give out too much of himself and not expect anything in return.

"No, it's not okay," Hyungwon mumbled, pulling his right hand up to his mouth and biting his nail. "They all think I'm crazy now."

"No they don't."

"Yes they do," Hyungwon said, his eyes dark as he continued biting. "Wonho couldn't even be in the same room as me. You saw him. It's because he doesn't believe me. He thinks I'm crazy, that I'm making all this up." Hyungwon shoved his bangs up with both hands, fisting the strands of hair out of frustration. "He doesn't think that maybe- that maybe I don't want to know about this either? That I'm not sick of seeing it every...every night? That I didn't doubt myself for a long time? That I'm not...that I'm not scared of going to sleep and dying all over again and it never stops, never ends-"

"Hey now," Changkyun whispered, pulling Hyungwon's hands down. "Look what you've done," he said, still keeping his voice soft so Hyungwon wouldn't think that he was being mean. Instead, he gazed sadly at the blood pooling at the end of Hyungwon's fingertips where a nail had been before Hyungwon had bitten it too short. "Come on, let's take care of that," he said, guiding Hyungwon's hand under the facet as he turned on cold water. Hyungwon flinched but allowed Changkyun to wash the blood away, and Changkyun turned off the facet a few moments later, patting the hand towel on Hyungwon's hand with gentle motions.

Then he looked up into Hyungwon's eyes. "Wonho just needs to get used to the idea, okay? He doesn't really remember Kihyun all that well, but we're still talking about a friend of his dying, and that's kind of a big deal. Just give him some time, okay? I'm sure he'll come around."

"Yeah," Hyungwon mumbled without confidence, and Changkyun's smile sagged before he forced it back up.

"And Jooheon is with you all the way. He's even letting us stay here. And you've got me..." He trailed off. "Not really sure how much that means to you, but...I'm here..."

Hyungwon looked up, feeling guilty for making his friend sad, and he patted the top of Changkyun's head, unable to properly express everything he wanted to say in words. "Thank you, Kyun."

Changkyun couldn't stop a small smile from appearing as he opened the door and ushered Hyungwon out of the bathroom. "You don't have to say it, Hyungwon. I know."

Hyungwon smiled at the ground until a knock sounded throughout the apartment, and he whipped his head up, his eyes wide with panic.

"Jooheon?" Changkyun asked, just as tense. "Who is it?"

"I don't know," said boy muttered, standing up and walking over to the door. "I didn't invite anybody, and my mom should be working right now. So who could-" He paused, putting his eye up to the peephole. "What the hell?"

"Is it someone from the institution?" Changkyun asked, gripping Hyungwon's hand too hard for comfort. "Are there here because of us? Do they know that we're here?"

"See for yourself," Jooheon answered, opening the door, and Changkyun felt all of his muscles lock until he saw the figure standing just outside the door frame.

"Shownu?"


	69. Chapter 69

"Shownu?" Changkyun said, scanning the figure top to bottom before noticing a figure behind him. "And Minhyuk?" He paused, processing for a moment, then looked over at Jooheon and nodded sharply, gesturing toward the door.

Jooheon nodded back, yanking Shownu and Minhyuk in and shutting the door, quickly sliding the bolt and chain.

Jooheon released his grip on Shownu's arm, and the older boy just rubbed his arm, Minhyuk grumbling under his breath about the lack of hospitality.

"Why didn't you tell us they were coming?" Changkyun asked, directing the question at Jooheon, who scowled back at him before scowling instead at Shownu and Minhyuk (but mainly Shownu).

"Because I didn't know they were coming. I never invited them." He looked over at the newcomers. "Hey. Why are you guys here? How do you even know where I live?"

"My brother told me," Shownu answered calmly. "He said you were all meeting up about Kihyun, and that we needed to be there. He told me your address."

"But how does your brother-" Changkyun began before Jooheon cut him off coldly.

"His brother is dead," Jooheon said, his eyes eyes locked with Shownu's.

Shownu just inclined his head. "And that's why I'm here. Because they're going to pin this thing on me if they get the chance, unless we beat them to it. And I brought Minhyuk along because he's one of us."

"Wait a-"

"His dead brother's ghost talks to him, and let's just say that he's not exactly been a good influence in the past," Jooheon said, still staring at Shownu before sighing. "Whatever. You're here now, and it's honestly not the worst thing that could have happened."

"Thanks," Minhyuk piped up, grimacing. "Awful kind of you. Feeling the love."

Jooheon rolled his eyes as Minhyuk squeezed onto the couch next to Changkyun, who huffed before scooting closer to Hyungwon so Minhyuk wasn't half on top of him.

"So why'd you two bust out?" Minhyuk asked, casting a side glance at them. "I'm assuming you busted out, because you're both batshit crazy and there wasn't anything that was gonna change that."

"Actually-" Jooheon began, but Changkyun waved him off.

"I don't have...psychic dreams...or whatever like Hyungwon, and I don't see ghosts, but...I was just thinking about everything Hyungwon had told me, and I was pretty sure that they were going to target Hyungwon next."

"Wait, Hyungwon has psychic dreams?" Minhyuk tilted his head, intrigued. "What's so special about him?" he asked before grinning at Hyungwon and patting his hand. "You're plenty special, don't worry," he reassured before looking back at Changkyun expectantly, as were Jooheon and Shownu.

"Well, it's not much, but..." Changkyun shifted uncomfortably. "Kihyun never really had visitors. He wasn't close to his family. And Hyungwon isn't, either. Hyungwon stopped letting them visit." Hyungwon tensed, and Changkyun just patted his thigh lightly. "And Kihyun is physically small. Hyungwon's tall, sure, but he's underweight. Physically speaking, they're the easiest targets. And since they aren't close to anyone on the outside, nobody would miss them."

Hyungwon just shrugged as if to agree, and the others mulled over Changkyun's words.

"Okay, but why would anyone want to kill Kihyun anyway? Or Hyungwon, for that matter?" Jooheon asked, and at that moment, Wonho re-entered the room from Jooheon's bedroom, avoiding eye contact with everyone and instead sitting down on the carpet, having eavesdropped on the conversation.

"I don't know," Changkyun mumbled. "Sick people, I guess."

"But  _who_?" Jooheon asked, frowning before turning to Shownu when the rest of the group came up with no answers. "Can't you ask your ghost pal to chip in a bit here?"

Shownu just gave Jooheon a calm look. "He isn't telling me anything right now."

"Your dreams," Wonho spoke up suddenly, not looking at Hyungwon, who tensed. "You were seeing them through Kihyun's eyes?"

"Yes," Hyungwon answered softly, clenching his long fingers.

"So you were seeing his death, exactly like it happened?"

Hyungwon frowned, his muscles all contracting. "I think so."

"So it was like watching the scene of a movie, right?" Wonho asked, drawing on the ground with a finger. He still didn't look up, perhaps afraid to meet Hyungwon's eyes, perhaps afraid to address that he was actually considering the idea of...whatever this whole thing was.

"What's your point?" Hyungwon asked, his eyebrows curving downward and defensiveness clear in his eyes.

"Just that, if it's like a movie, why can't you just let it play on? Why can't you stick around to see what happens next?"

Everyone was silent. Then Changkyun spoke. "That's too risky. We don't know how they even work. I mean, Hyungwon feels like it's really happening to  _him_. He's experiencing it, not just seeing it happen. That's traumatic enough, yeah? And what if he doesn't wake up in time and ends up suffocating? What if he..."  _What if he dies?_  "Kihyun is already dead. There's no point in anyone getting hurt over this, okay?"

"Yeah, okay," Wonho said, slumping a bit.

But Hyungwon sat still on the couch, thinking.

_What if I don't stop the movie?_


	70. Chapter 70

_Hands, squeezing at his neck, each finger straining. Hyungwon's vision was a pond, each stone skip rippling out in reds and blues and blacks. Through the spots in his vision, he could see the hands that threatened to end him, but not the face._

_Someone was killing him, and he didn't know who._

_Hyungwon gasped abruptly. He was just beginning to run out of oxygen. It was a strange feeling, reaching for more, expecting it to be there as it always had, but coming up empty. Hyungwon's own fingers scrabbled against the ones suffocating him, trying to gain a hold and pry the other off, but his fingers slid over the smooth skin, slipping right off. He held up a hand to his attacker, a hand that was ignored._

_It fell to his side, and then_

_Hyungwon died._

_Another strange sensation. You live your whole life tuning out the white noise, but then it all cuts out to true silence. In a sense, it's terrifying._

_The hands around his neck loosened, and Hyungwon fell limp to the ground, none of his muscles responding to his call to break the fall. From his position looking down a grassy hill, he could see the night sky, the moon oddly misshapen and skewed._

_Then he felt fingers unbuttoning his shirt one by one, the hands oddly delicate in their motions despite their previous actions. The disembodied hands began to take off his shirt and-_

"Hyungwon!"

Hyungwon choked, trying to inhale all the air at once and coughing instead. He wheezed, pulling air into his lungs bit by bit. He felt dizzy, nauseous.

"Hyungwon, thank God," Changkyun mumbled, pulling Hyungwon into a close embrace, holding him tightly.

"Let go," Hyungwon gasped, pushing Changkyun way, and Changkyun released him, hurt in his eyes, but the feeling of being hugged was altogether too similar to the feeling of being suffocated - an applied pressure, intimate and purposeful. "Sorry," Hyungwon said, his shaking hand tapping the top of Changkyun's. "I can't- not right now, I can't-"

Changkyun just nodded, capturing Hyungwon's shaking hand in both of his and holding it still. He looked down, not meeting Hyungwon's eyes. "You stopped breathing, Hyungwon. And I...I didn't know if you were going to start again. I was scared."

Hyungwon nodded, not saying anything. He knew it would only upset Changkyun, and he didn't want to upset the younger boy, but he couldn't exactly say that he was wrong. And he was still quite shaken from what he'd seen.

The four of them had taken the carpet. Jooheon had offered his own bed to Hyungwon and Changkyun, who had refused, which left the carpet or the couch. Changkyun had gotten rather used to sleeping next to Hyungwon, however, so they both opted for the carpet, leaving Wonho to take the couch and Minhuk and Shownu to join Changkyun and Hyungwon.

Both Minhyuk and Shownu were also awake, Shownu still lying down but angled toward Hyungwon, whereas Minhyuk had sat up, his back against the couch, and was watching with worry in his eyes.

"What happened?" Minhyuk asked, his eyes bouncing back and forth between Changkyun and Hyungwon.

Changkyun shot him a harsh look. "He's not ready to talk about-"

"It's okay," Hyungwon said, closing his eyes and letting himself focus on breathing. It was funny how scary it had been to have it ripped away, and yet he knew he'd be taking it for granted once more in just a few minutes.

"Well?" Minhyuk asked.

Hyungwon opened his eyes. "I..." He blinked, unsure of what to say. His mouth hung open for several beats, his chest still heaving up and down, although less violently than earlier. "I didn't stop the movie," he said, his voice soft, words mainly for himself but open for the others as well.

They were quiet until Changkyun turned and smack Wonho's leg, and Wonho jolted.

"What- what was that for?!" he asked, groaning and turning over.

"Your stupid idea almost killed Hyungwon!" Changkyun yelled, smacking Wonho's leg again, and Wonho sat up.

"What?!"

"He stopped breathing. His face stared turning purple, man."

The two of them began bickering back and forth as to whose fault it was and whether or not Hyungwon was okay, but Hyungwon tuned them out.

 _The moon,_  he thought suddenly.  _The moon was so strange. It was supposed to be perfectly round, but the edges weren't lining up, like someone had cut it out of construction paper and hadn't fit it together perfectly._

The image of the moon was clear in his mind above all else. The face was still a mystery to him, and even the hands weren't that distinctive.

But the moon, the moon he remembered.

"The moon..."

"What's he talking about?" Minhyuk whispered to Shownu, whose lips twitched downward.

"I don't know. Sometimes, we live in our own worlds. We make our own definitions and our own meanings, and we don't allow anyone else to be a part of that," Shownu said, his voice low enough so that only Minhyuk could hear him. "Maybe it means something to him, but we'll never know."

The bedroom door swung inward, and Jooheon stalked out, his face all pinched-up. "Wonho, Changkyun, stop yelling at each other! All you two have done is fight, and I'm honestly sick of it! If you two can't..."

Jooheon's voice faded as Hyungwon's focus intensified. "The moon..." he repeated, tilting his head and staring down at the carpet, his eyes running around the rectangular border while his mind processed what he'd seen and tried to find a logical explanation.

His eyes had traced two laps around the carpet before his head snapped up and he cut off Jooheon. "The  _moon_ ," he said, his voice insistent, and a small smile spread to his lips as a giggle spilled forth.

They all looked at him like...well, like he was crazy.

Maybe he was.

"The moon," he repeated, his laughter dissipating. "Don't you see?"

"Hyungwon, explain what you mean," Changkyun said slowly, turning to his friend. "Did you see something important?"

Hyungwon nodded, a smile still on his face. "The moon," he repeated yet again.

Changkyun ignored a sigh from one of the others. If it was important to Hyungwon, then they should take it seriously, too. "What's so important about the moon, Hyungwon?"

"It was all cut-up. The edges didn't match," Hyungwon said, something light in his voice. He held the answer to a riddle, and he wanted someone else to see it as well.

"Okay," Changkyun said, frowning slightly. "Do you guys know what that means?" he asked, turning to the others, but Hyungwon spoke up again, saving them from fumbling for an answer that none of them knew.

"A lake," Hyungwon said. "It was a lake that I saw. I didn't see the moon. I saw the moon's reflection. That's why it was weird. The water. A lake."


	71. Chapter 71

"A lake?" Jooheon repeated, moving closer to Hyungwon and giving Changkyun a look. "That's where you...where you saw Kihyun die?"

Hyungwon nodded. "I saw a lake, reflecting the moon."

Jooheon looked over at Changkyun, his brow furrowed. "There's a lake not too far from here. And it's not far from the institution, either. If he was killed there..."

"Then his body is probably in the lake," Changkyun finished grimly.

They were all quiet.

"What are we supposed to do?" Wonho asked, looking between Changkyun and Jooheon, who seemed to be in charge.

"We need to find him," Shownu answered, his voice calm and soothing for such a dark topic. "We need to recover the body."

Wonho flinched back. "That's crazy! How are we supposed to-"

"We need to bring him to peace," Shownu answered. "People who die a violent death that isn't resolved can't move on. Kihyun's spirit could be trapped at the bottom of a lake until the end of time."

The idea of Kihyun drowning infinitely made Wonho swallow, even if he didn't know the boy that well.

Even Minhyuk seemed perturbed at the thought.

"So we find this lake," Jooheon said, sucking in his bottom lip as he thought. "And then what? If we try to get the police involved, they'll think we did it."

Wonho looked over, his brows furrowed. "No, I'm sure they wouldn't suspect us. I mean, we didn't want to hurt him. Why would we kill him?"

Jooheon leveled an annoyed looked at Wonho. "I show overly aggressive symptoms. Shownu is basically schizophrenic. Changkyun believes in every type of monster, ever. Kihyun was paranoid about everyone and everything. Minhyuk alternates between depressive and manic cycles. Hyungwon has reoccurring nightmares of people's deaths."

"Kihyun's death," Hyungwon whispered to clarify.

Jooheon looked back at Wonho. "And you barely even know your own name. Still think the cops are going to believe us? Still think they won't just throw us back in M-wing?"

"I don't want to go back," someone murmured, and they all nodded with varying degrees of intensity.

"Who here can swim?" Shownu asked, looking around.

"You're joking, right?" Minhyuk asked, the color leeching from his face.

Shownu's silence was answer enough. Slowly, hands were raised. Jooheon was first, then Minhyuk with a frown, then Wonho, then Changkyun, who cast a glance at Hyungwon.

"I can also swim," Shownu said. "Which makes five of us. We're just going to have to search the lake ourselves. Hyungwon can stand watch on the shore. Then, when we find Kihyun, we need to bring him up."

Minhyuk cringed, imagining himself towing a dead body out of the water. Each of the other participants looked similarly ill. Only Hyungwon was unaffected, off in his own little world, a world that was quickly becoming his reality.

"What if we don't find him?" Wonho asked, swallowing. Everyone but Hyungwon looked at him because they all knew what he was really asking:  _What if Hyungwon is wrong? What if this is all a lie? What if Hyungwon's just crazy?_

Shownu ignored Wonho, standing up. "Everybody get ready to go. We need to buy supplies. If you have money, grab it."

"C'mon," Changkyun said softly, rubbing Hyungwon's back and sliding his hand to Hyungwon's arm, pulling him lightly. "We should get changed."

"Oh, yeah," Jooheon said as the two stood up. "I've got some spare clothes for you guys. Let me grab them."

Changkyun nodded, and Hyungwon smiled. It was odd, Changkyun thought to himself, how healthy Hyungwon had seemed recently. He hadn't had any sudden collapses due to his narcolepsy, and he didn't seem as emotionally torn, minus the moment he'd witnessed in the bathroom.

Maybe it was because the world Hyungwon had been living in, one of unknown figures in the dark and death during the night, was becoming real for all of them. It was something he could share now instead of something that isolated him.

Or maybe it was simply because he felt like the others believed in him for the first time.


	72. Chapter 72

It was almost midnight, and the six of them were shivering, stamping their feet against the wet grass.

Five of them were wearing wetsuits and they'd picked up earlier, and Shownu was passing heavy flashlights around.

"The lake isn't that deep," Shownu said. "If you find anything, swim up and get the others." He turned to Hyungwon. "You'll be okay here by yourself?" Shownu asked. Changkyun opened his mouth, his brows furrowing, before closing it.

"I'll be okay," Hyungwon said before looking across the lake, transfixed. "The moon," he said softly, staring at the reflection on the lake, exactly as he'd seen it in his dream.

"All right," Shownu said, turning to the others. "Let's go search for him."

"Ask your ghost brother to chip in too, okay?" Jooheon asked under his breath.

"If he starts talking about Kihyun, I'll listen" was Shownu's reply.

And then the five of them, some with more misgivings than others, were wading into the lake, leaving Hyungwon behind on the shore to gaze at the moon's reflection.

It was really beautiful in a way, he thought. The subtle ripples dragged the moon out, spreading it across the lake. The water looked pure black, the moon pure white.

And somewhere underneath that black veil lay Kihyun's body, somewhere the moon couldn't reach.

But they'd find him and bring him back so the gentle moonlight could kiss his pale skin. They  _needed_  to find him, because right now, Kihyun was lost.

Hyungwon continued staring at the surface of the lake. Every now and then, he'd hear one of the others swim up for air or talk to each other.

"Did you see anything?"

A sigh. "No. You?"

"Why would I ask you if I'd found him, you idiot?"

Hyungwon brought his knees in to his chest and rocked back and forth slightly. He still couldn't get over the fact that they'd believed him, that somebody had finally  _listened_  to him. He'd been having the dreams for a year or two now, and when he'd told people what he'd seen, all he received in reply were indecipherable looks and muddled whispers. Ripples that had grown too small to reach him. But he knew. He knew that everybody thought he was crazy.

His mother.

His siblings.

His father, who had never said a word about it. Sometimes, he had looked at Hyungwon like he  _wanted_ to believe, and Hyungwon had stared back, begging with his eyes for someone to trust him. Because it had been a lonely existence, constantly driving people away. But what was he supposed to have done? It was true for him, real for him, and he couldn't live by fostering a lie.

But truth hurt people. It pushed them away. It made him lonely, alone.

He was still lonely, but he wasn't alone.

Water lapped up against the shore as more voices filtered over to his ears.

"Still nothing."

"There's just too much to search."

"I shouldn't do it. It's wrong...No, I can't..."

Hyungwon closed his eyes. The air was cool on his face, cold even, but it didn't bother him. There'd been no breeze in the institution. There'd been no moon, either.

But there had been Kihyun.

As though summoned by the thought, Hyungwon felt hands going around his throat and squeezing. He felt the memory of ten fingers pressing down on him, trying to cut off his -  _Kihyun's_  - air.

He started to feel light-headed and dizzy, and that's when he tried to take a deep breath to push the memory of the dream away, only-

Only, he couldn't take a deep breath. He couldn't breathe at all.

Feeling a familiar panic start to settle in his system as adrenaline began flowing through his veins, his eyes fluttered open. He could make out the dark sky and the moon reflecting off the lake.

_Dream?_

_Or reality?_

_Dream..._

_or..._

His chest heaved as it scraped the bottom of his lungs for air that simply wasn't there. He felt wet streaks on his face. He couldn't remember that detail from his dreams. Was it a new dream?

_Or is this not a dream at all?_

He tried to call out for help, but no words escaped his lips. A low noise came out of his throat as he grasped desperately for air. And just as within the dream, he raised his hands, tried to push his attacker away, but they fluttered weakly, powerless.

"I'm sorry," the attacker said. Hyungwon couldn't make out the face. But he didn't remember that in the old dream, either. There had been no apology.

He felt something hot begin to burn in his stomach with that realization.

_This isn't a dream._

_I'm going to die._

_Me._

_Not Kihyun._

_I'm going to..._

A strong force slammed into them, and Hyungwon was thrown off to the side, air returning inside his lungs all at once, as though he were swallowing an explosion. It hurt to breathe, it hurt to think, it hurt to even see, so he shut his eyes, curling into a ball, his chest pumping up and down, and each breath felt like he was being stabbed, each exhalation like the knife was being twisted on the way out. Tears were streaming down his face, but it was all just too much for him to take in. He needed silence, he needed darkness, he needed the absence of everything and everyone.

And someone had wanted the absence of him, as well.

"Damn it, Shownu!" Jooheon yelled, but his voice sounded strange and faraway, as though he were shouting from underwater. Hyungwon ignored it, ignored _him_ , ignored everything.

A few feet away from Hyungwon's curled-up form was Shownu, his fingers twitching slightly from being tensed.


	73. Chapter 73

Jooheon had been keeping a close eye on Shownu since he'd surfaced at his apartment out of the blue. He'd wanted to kick the older boy out, but he'd decided (wrongly, in hindsight) that it wasn't worth arguing to the others. There'd been something magical almost about having M-wing together outside of M-wing.

To have them be...friends.

Not patients forced to be in the same space, but real, actual friends, something none of them had anymore.

He'd wanted it to work out, he really had. But when he'd swam up to see Shownu strangling Hyungwon, he'd regretted letting the older boy ever get back in touch with them.

He'd swam to shore as quickly as possible, his lungs burning as he focused on distance and speed rather than breathing comfortably. Once he could feel solid ground beneath his feet, he'd rushed forward, hurtling all of his weight into Shownu's mass.

His head instantly ached, but the momentary pain was worth it once he confirmed that he'd dislodged Shownu from Hyungwon.

"Damn it, Shownu!" he yelled at the nearest figure on the ground, who was just flexing his fingers calmly. "You just tried to kill Hyungwon!"

Shownu looked up as though he'd only just realized that someone was talking to him. "I guess I did."

Jooheon clenched his jaw. "Hyungwon is our  _friend_ , Shownu."

Shownu looked down. "I know. But he told me to do it. I said no but he said I had to."

"Did you kill Kihyun?" Jooheon asked after a moment, a sick feeling in his stomach. He'd known that something like this could happen, and yet...he'd only been a few seconds away from a dead Hyungwon.

"No," Shownu answered, and even though Jooheon didn't trust Shownu's intentions, he trusted his words. "Kihyun really is dead, though. He told me so."

"Shownu," Jooheon said, his voice breaking somewhat. "When are you going to stop listening to him and doing what he tells you? All he does is hurt people, Shownu. He makes  _you_  hurt people. Is that what you want?" He swallowed. "Hurting your friends? Is that what you want?"

Shownu was silent, and Jooheon just shook his head, going over to Hyungwon.

"Hey," Jooheon said, but when he touched Hyungwon, the thin boy flinched, and Jooheon retracted his hand. " _Shit_ ," he whispered, taking in Hyungwon's state. The boy was sobbing, curled up in a ball, rocking back and forth, hands over his head to protect himself from any possible threats.

Jooheon didn't think this was something that would just go away by itself.

He wanted to get Wonho or Changkyun since they'd roomed with him and probably had more experience handling his panic attacks, but that would mean leaving Shownu with Hyungwon, and Jooheon was too scared to let that happen.

But then something else happened.

"I found something," someone yelled from the lake, and the other swimmers gathered. Jooheon hesitated, wanting to go forward and help, but his eyes slid over to Shownu, who was lying still on the dark grass.

"They probably need help," Shownu said after a second, avoiding eye contact with Jooheon as he rose and waded back into the lake.

Jooheon stayed on land, watching Shownu gradually get smaller and smaller until his figure was submerged in the inky depths, and then Jooheon looked back to Hyungwon, whose condition had neither improved nor changed. Jooheon had seen enough cases like this, Kihyun included, to know that it would only make it worse if he attempted to intervene. Usually, the patient would be sedated, but since they'd removed Hyungwon from the institution, there was no one to sedate him.

Jooheon bit his lip as he was struck by a troubling thought.  _Did we make the wrong decision in breaking him out?_

Because honestly, he had never felt more helpless in his life, and he knew that they couldn't fix Hyungwon. He didn't know if the institution could, but if there was an answer out there, they weren't it.

And for someone who had only recently gained something akin to friendship, it was physically painful for him to be forced to watch his friend writhing on the ground in internal agony and be unable to soothe his pain.

A distraction presented itself, however, as dark, glistening figures approach the shore. The only sound was the soft but repetitive lapping of water against the shore.

Jooheon felt his heart sink a bit lower in his rib cage when he made out an indistinct white shape among them, and it wasn't the reflection of the moon.


	74. Chapter 74

Changkyun wanted to throw up.

He'd heard Wonho yell about having found something, but as much as he wanted Hyungwon's dream to be a reality in order to make Hyungwon feel sane, he wasn't altogether that eager about turning up the bloated corpse of a boy he'd known, a boy he had maybe been friends with, a boy he could at least empathize with.

But as much as he'd been hoping the "something" Wonho had found was a mistake, he was wrong. It didn't look like the Kihyun he remembered, but it was him. He still looked fairly recognizable, probably due to the season, as the water was naturally colder and had preserved the corpse fairly well.

But the image didn't resonate with the one in his mind, the Kihyun with narrowed eyes who made sharp, mean comments. It wasn't that he'd liked Kihyun. He doubted if anyone really had, with the exception of Hyungwon, for whatever reason. But he knew that Kihyun hadn't chosen to become the Kihyun he remembered. None of them had  _chosen_  this, this life of isolation and questioning. But that was the Kihyun he knew, mean, sure, and bitter and harsh and-

And alive.

He tried not to look down at the pale body that they were towing back to land. Wonho had found him, weighed down by bags of rocks that had been tied to his wrists and ankles. The body - Changkyun had a hard time calling it Kihyun - had been stripped, and dark bruising was present around the throat. Changkyun tried not to look, but the image was burned into his mind, shadows of fingers long gone twisting around the fragile skin, fingers Hyungwon had also known.

He didn't understand how anyone could do that to a person, especially to someone like them, someone already broken. Was the person trying to break Kihyun even further? Or were they trying to fix him?

Could any of them be fixed?

The soles of his feet kissed ground, and he abandoned the effort of swimming, choosing to walk instead. He couldn't look at the body, so he stared straight ahead instead. After a few seconds, he was able to make out two figures in the darkness. One was sitting, facing them, knees drawn up, elbows resting on top of them.  _Jooheon._

The other was simply a dense dart mass of compact matter.  _Hyungwon._

Changkyun felt his pulse begin to accelerate, but he forced himself to focus. He had a job he needed to do. Jooheon was with Hyungwon. He'd be okay.

For now, he had to get the body out of the water.

A minute later and it was done. They laid the body down on the grass gently, not that Kihyun needed it now. It didn't matter how kindly they treated his corpse. But still, while unspoken, they felt it was something they had to do.

Wonho grabbed a spare shirt from his bag of equipment and draped it over the body, covering things not meant to be seen, from the upper thighs to the throat.

"It's him," Minhyuk said, his voice hoarse. Changkyun hadn't heard him speak since they'd found the body. Maybe even before that. Changkyun didn't think they really believed Hyungwon until they'd seen the hand, rope connecting a bag of rocks with pale, violated skin. "It's Kihyun."

Jooheon shushed them harshly. "Don't let Hyungwon see," he said, keeping his voice low. His eyes darted down once, scanning the face, before he looked up. He didn't look down again. "We need to get him out of here."

"What's going on?" Changkyun asked, trying to see past Jooheon, but the darkness obscured most of his vision, and Jooheon's figure blocked the rest.

"He's having a panic attack," Jooheon said, although his eyes strayed to Shownu's before looking back at Changkyun. "Can you help him to the car? We'll take care of..." He paused, swallowing, although he didn't allow his eyes to betray any weakness. "We'll take care of him." His voice was soft, delicate. Possessive, not in a needy way, but in the manner of ownership, of belonging. Kihyun belonged to them, and they to him. He was one of them, and they would take care of him. They had found him when he was lost. They would not abandon him.

Changkyun pushed past Jooheon, feeling relief flood his system with each step he put between himself and the body, but when he saw his friend on the ground, shaking, moonlight reflecting off of tears, he felt himself grow weak.

"Hey," he whispered, crouching down beside Hyungwon. "I'm here. I'm here, Hyungwon. Me, Changkyun. We..." He paused, not sure if what he was about to say would make it worse. "We found him, Hyungwon. We found Kihyun. You were right, Hyungwon. He was there. We found him."

Hyungwon flinched, his hands slowly retracting from their position over his head, but he didn't stop rocking back and forth.

Changkyun's eyes darkened. He couldn't bear to see his friend in such pain, and he didn't know what had caused it. "I'm going to help you back to the car, okay?"

Hyungwon didn't respond, and Changkyun hesitated before reaching out and ever so gently sifting his fingers through Hyungwon's hair. Hyungwon stilled but didn't open his eyes, and Changkyun slowly moved his hand from Hyungwon's hair to his shoulder before helping Hyungwon stand up, taking on most of the taller boy's weight, and helping him move to the car.

They'd accomplished their goal, but there was no joy in such a dark task.


	75. Chapter 75

The biggest question that popped up was, quite naturally, what the hell to do with a dead body.

The question was asked outside of Hyungwon's ears. Changkyun had helped transport him to Jooheon's room, where he'd helped lay the tall boy down and cover him with blankets. Hyungwon had reached up toward his neck several times, and Changkyun had resorted to holding his hands down. It broke something in him, watching his friend struggle against his grip, but Changkyun couldn't risk Hyungwon hurting himself. After a while, he'd been forced to wrap a tight sheet over Hyungwon's upper body, tucking in the edges so Hyungwon couldn't move his arms.

But he didn't have another option. He couldn't trust Hyungwon with himself, and he couldn't stay to watch over him.

Changkyun shut the door to Jooheon's room, closing it softly in the unlikely hopes that Hyungwon had exhausted himself into sleep, before joining the others in the living room.

Jooheon looked up at Changkyun, who shook his head, and Jooheon clenched his jaw, his eyes darkening as he scanned the group.

"So," Jooheon said, his body tense. He was seated closest to his room, a barrier between Hyungwon and Shownu, who was seated on the opposite side of the room. "What do we do with him?"

They'd left Kihyun's body, wrapped with a black sheet they'd brought with, in the back of the car.

"We can't go to the police now," Minhyuk said, biting his nails and staring down at the ground. His nail began bleeding. He didn't notice. Changkyun moved to him and gently pried his hand away from his mouth. "They'll think we killed him."

"Or at the very least, they're going to question why we went and found his body, a body that we couldn't have possibly known the location of if we hadn't played a part in his death," Wonho said, his voice soft. He hadn't said much either recently. Changkyun thought it was because he'd realized that he'd been wrong to ignore Hyungwon the whole time.

"We've screwed ourselves over," Jooheon agreed reluctantly, clenching his jaw and leaning forward. "So how do we get out of this?"

"Can't we just bury him?" Minhyuk asked, raising his hand once more, but Changkyun pulled it down, holding it in his lap. "Let's put him in the ground and forget about all of this. Nobody has to know." His eyes were bright, desperate. "We found him, right? We did our part. That's enough. We're done now, right? We can go home?"

Home. An empty word and distinct pain for each of them.

"Kihyun can't go home," Jooheon said, his voice distinctly angry. His fists were clenched, the knuckles turning white. "Somebody did that to him. That someone is still out there."

"But is that our problem?" Minhyuk asked, his right leg jerking up and down, his hands jittery. "We got them out. They're safe. We're safe. Kihyun's dead, so he doesn't matter anymore."

"But what if this person, whoever they are, kills someone else?" Jooheon asked. He didn't want to be the one to ask the question, but nobody else was stepping up.

Minhyuk shrugged, biting his lip. His eyes seemed large and unfocused. "So what?" he asked, his voice sounding hollow in the small apartment. When he felt their eyes on him, he twitched, his eyes narrowing defensively. "I don't care about anyone in that institution. They're nothing to me. Everything I have is here or in my house. So a few boys turn up in a lake. How is that any different from what's going on in the world anyway? People are always dying. And like you guys said, if they're only picking kids who have no one left, what's the harm in that? Maybe it's better for them that way, you know? A quick end to a miserable existence."

Jooheon stared at Minhyuk. "That could have been Hyungwon. It could have been any of us, Minhyuk."

Minhyuk gave no reaction. "But it wasn't. Kihyun was one of us. I get that. But we found him. Problem solved. This- from here on out, this is someone else's problem. We don't owe anyone anything."

Jooheon stared at him, his eyes narrowed. He wanted to yell at Minhyuk, but he couldn't, because they'd all had the same thought at one point or another.

It was Changkyun who spoke up next. "I know you're scared, Minhyuk," he said softly, staring down at Minhyuk's hand trapped within his own, his finger still bleeding. "But Kihyun was scared too, and if we don't stop this person, some other kid is going to experience that too, some kid who has people who love him, friends if he's lucky, his dad, his mom."

Minhyuk's eyes teared up at the thought of his own mother, a women who was near impossible to love, and yet he did anyway.

"How do you think Kihyun's mom is going to feel when she finds out that her son is dead?" Changkyun continued. "How do you think another mom might feel, knowing that her child was murdered and abandoned? How many moms have to go through that, Minhyuk? How will they feel knowing that we had to chance to do something about it and we didn't?"

Minhyuk's soft  _hiccs_  filled the room as he tried to restrain the flow of tears from his eyes.

"So we see this through to the end," Jooheon concluded, not without sympathy in his eyes, but somebody needed to step up as leader. He didn't trust Shownu, so he was out. Wonho has been wishy-washy about the whole thing. Minhyuk has never really learned to handle his condition, which rendered him unstable. And Changkyun was strong and capable, but he didn't really aspire to anything more than keeping Hyungwon safe.

So Jooheon stepped up. "I think we need to bury Kihyun."

They all nodded to themselves.

"And then we need to find the son of a bitch that murdered our friend."


	76. Chapter 76

Changkyun stood up as the others began discussing where and when to bury Kihyun ("soon, because if we get pulled over by the cops and they find a dead body in the back, that's going to be a mess") and returned to Jooheon's room. He turned around to see Hyungwon staring at him with wide, frightened eyes, hands still bound to his sides.

"Hyungwon?" Changkyun asked, stepping forward hesitantly. "Are you okay?"

"Please," Hyungwon said, his voice rough, and his eyes watered before leaking tears. He couldn't even brush them away. Instead, they followed the slope of his accented cheek bones, sliding off his smooth face and onto the pillow. "Please, let me go," he begged.

"Hyungwon?" Changkyun asked, taking another step, and Hyungwon flinched. Changkyun stepped back. "It's me, Changkyun. Hyungwon, do you-"

"Please, I'll do...I'll do anything, just- just let me go, okay," Hyungwon continued, his voice cracking. "Please. I won't tell anyone. Please, just let me go."

"Hyungwon," Changkyun said, distressed, but just as he went to move closer, Hyungwon's entire frame stiffened before going limp, his eyes rolling back before closing as his body went still. "Shit," Changkyun whispered before quickly moving forward and taking the boy's pulse. He released a long exhalation when he felt a steady beat.

"Changkyun?" Jooheon asked, entering the room, and Changkyun turned, worry in his eyes.

"He just passed out," he said before looking back at his unconscious friend. "He was weird. I don't think he recognized me."

The two were quiet.

Then they both spoke up.

"We need to get him-" Jooheon began just as Changkyun said, "I think he needs-"

"Help," they both finished before looking over at each other.

"He's been getting worse," Changkyun said, biting his bottom lip.

"I know," Jooheon said, nodding as he walked closer to the bed, looking down at Hyungwon. "This whole thing is tearing him apart." Jooheon took the edge of his sleeve and gently dabbed at Hyungwon's cheeks, smoothing away the leftover tears.

"What are we going to do with him?" Changkyun asked softly. He knew that Hyungwon probably couldn't hear them, but he didn't want to make his friend feel abandoned. "We can't take care of him anymore, Jooheon. He's self-destructing. I bound his arms so he wouldn't hurt himself, but I don't want to have to do that."

Jooheon side, massaging the pooling tension in the back of his neck. "Let me worry about that, okay. We just need a little more time. We can't do anything until we find out who killed Kihyun. Until then, no one is safe."

Changkyun nodded. "Hyung...why did Hyungwon break down at the lake?"

Jooheon was quiet. "I'm sure it was hard for him to be there. You know he has a hard time deciphering dreams from reality. He was probably very confused."

"But he doesn't have an attack without something setting him off," Changkyun insisted, looking back at Hyungwon's still frame before frowning and moving closer. He hadn't noticed it before, but Hyungwon's neck looked somewhat red. "What the hell?" He looked up at Jooheon, who had been silent. "Jooheon, what happened to him?"

Jooheon was quiet for a moment before he looked up at Changkyun. "I'd appreciate if you wouldn't tell everyone else what I'm about to tell you."

Changkyun nodded, brows furrowed.

"Shownu's brother - the one he claims to see who's dead - tells him to do things. Bad things." Jooheon sighed. "That's the real reason we got moved to M-wing, because of something that his brother made him do. And when we were at the lake, Shownu's brother told him to hurt Hyungwon."

Changkyun's eyes widened. "But- why?"

Jooheon shrugged, looking down and playing with his fingers. "His brother is pissed off, is my guess. There was an accident. It wasn't really Shownu's fault, but in a way, it was. His brother died because of it. His parents can barely look at him. It's all fucked up. They know that he can see their dead son, or at least that he says that he can. The mom can't let go of him. She uses Shownu as a connection to him. The dad- he thinks Shownu lies about seeing him to spite them, somehow. To punish them. They still think of Shownu's brother as their precious little son. But he's not. He's malicious, Changkyun. He lashes out, persuading Shownu to hurt people, especially people Shownu cares about. He wants other people to feel his pain, and he wants his brother to suffer." Jooheon ran a hand through his hair.

Changkyun watched his hand shake.

"I just- Shownu isn't bad, okay? But his brother is. That's why I didn't want him here, because he always listens to his brother. So just...keep him away from Hyungwon, all right? Keep an eye on him. But don't...don't hate Shownu for what he did. It hurts him too."

Changkyun nodded slowly. He didn't know what he'd say if he were able to string words together at the moment. He was angry at having been left in the dark. Furious that someone had tried to hurt Hyungwon, someone who was only one wall away. But sad, too, because they all had something hanging over them. Hyungwon had been living with a nightmare, Shownu with a vengeful ghost. Minhyuk couldn't abandon his mother. Jooheon, his anger. Wonho, his identity. Changkyun, his monsters.

It seemed that all they could do was hurt others, when all they wanted was to be loved.


	77. Chapter 77

Hyungwon didn't wake up for several hours, but when he did, his face was pale and his body trembled beneath the sweat-soaked sheets.

"Hey," Changkyun said softly, stirring as he noticed that Hyungwon had awoken. "How are you feeling?"

Hyungwon swallowed, moving to draw his hand up, but his motion was stopped by the tightly-wrapped sheets. He looked down in confusion, his eyes twin windows of vulnerability. "Why...I can't..." He looked back up at Changkyun, still struggling against the sheets. "Kyun, I can't move my arms."

Changkyun rolled his lips inward.

"Kyun, help me, please," Hyungwon repeated.

Changkyun sighed, massaging his temple. "I'm sorry Hyungwon, I can't...I can't do that. You were going to hurt yourself." He paused. "Do you remember that? Do you remember what happened?"

But Hyungwon wasn't focusing on Changkyun's words. "Kyun, I can't move my arms," he repeated from earlier, looking down in dismay. "Kyun, please, help me."

Changkyun squeezed his eyes shut for a moment before drawing closer. "Hyungwon, do you remember earlier? How you were behaving?"

Hyungwon looked up, the vulnerability in his eyes overwritten by panic. "I'm okay now, Kyun. I'm better now. I'll be good, I promise."

Changkyun tried to ignore the desperation that had latched onto his friend. "This is for your own safety, Hyungwon, okay? Do you understand that? We're trying to keep you safe."

"Please, I'll be good," Hyungwon said, his eyes tearing up. "Please, let me go."

Changkyun exhaled, feeling his resolve shatter. "Okay, but only while I'm with you, okay? I'm sorry, Hyungwon, but when you're alone, we'll have to do that." He untucked the sheets on both sides, pulling them out so they became loose. "Do you want to go to the bathroom, Hyungwon?" he asked.

He was treating his friend like a five-year-old.

"Yes, please," Hyungwon answered back, his voice soft and docile like a child's.

Changkyun slid a hand underneath Hyungwon's back and helped him to an upright position before helping him out of the bed. Then he lead Hyungwon out of the bedroom and into the bathroom, Hyungwon pulling his clothes tight the whole way and wrapping his arms around himself.

Once inside the bathroom, Hyungwon hesitated, looking over at Changkyun expectantly.

"I'm sorry, Hyungwon, but I can't leave you alone. You know that, right?"

Hyungwon nodded weakly. Changkyun turned away so he wasn't watching Hyungwon, but he kept an eye on his upper half in the mirror. Once he heard the toilet flush, he moved out of the way and waited for Hyungwon to wash his hands, pumping the soap twice and letting the water wash the bubbles away. Then Changkyun led him back to the bedroom and held up the covers so Hyungwon could crawl back in. Changkyun set the blanket down but didn't sheet wrap Hyungwon just yet.

"What are you going to do about him?" Hyungwon spoke up, and Changkyun met his eyes, biting his lip.

"We aren't sure yet," Changkyun said. Which was partially true. They weren't exactly sure what to do about Kihyun, but they planned to bury him, privately. They didn't want his mother to know, and they didn't want the cops to know.

"I'm scared of him," Hyungwon whispered, sinking lower into the bed.

Changkyun frowned. The image of Kihyun's corpse had scared him as well. He'd never seen a dead person before, much less a friend, much less a murdered friend. The pale skin, the limpness of limbs- the thought of it sent a tremor through his body. "He can't hurt you," Changkyun answered lightly, trying to smile.

"No, he'll find me," Hyungwon said, shaking his head and looking up at Changkyun. "You can't let him find me."

"He won't," Changkyun said, his heart sinking. He didn't know if there was anything left of Hyungwon to salvage anymore. "Kihyun can't find you, Hyungwon. He's...he's gone."

"Not Kihyun," Hyungwon whined, his eyes pleading with Changkyun.

Changkyun hesitated, taking half a step back. "Hyungwon, who are you talking about?"

"Dr. Irving," Hyungwon said, his eyes big and wide and certain. "You can't let him find me or he'll kill me too."


	78. Chapter 78

The dream had been different this time. Instead of starting at the beginning, it was as though someone had selected a scene from the middle of the movie.

When the dream started, Hyungwon was lying naked on the grass.

He should have felt the blades tickling at his unfettered skin, but he didn't. Instead, his body felt heavy, immobile. He couldn't close his eyes.

He was staring at the moon again, only the real moon this time, not a reflection. The sky was pitch black, a spattering of stars tossed across the landscape above as though they'd been thrown recklessly. Hyungwon wanted to reach out and grab a star for himself, but it was so far away, and his arm was so heavy. The more he stared at them, the farther they seemed to be, like they were running away from him, hurrying to escape his gaze.

It made him sad. He wanted to look away, but he couldn't. His head was as heavy as the rest of him. His eyes felt heavy as well, and yet they wouldn't close.

He felt tired.

A voice drifted to his ears, disembodied, as the speaker was out of sight. "You're all better now." A man, smiling down at him kindly, hope shining within his eyes. "I'm so proud of you." The man paused, his smile fading into a small frown. "I'm sorry about this, but I have to do it, okay? They don't understand. I fixed you. You're all better now," the man repeated as he went about something, disappearing from Hyungwon's vision. Something rustled, and the man's face reappeared. "This won't hurt at all, now. Just hold still." He laughed softly, and he reached across Hyungwon, grasping Hyungwon's wrist. "Good boy." He knotted a thick rope around Hyungwon's thin wrist, drawing the ends tight, and although Hyungwon felt entirely numb, he could feel the pressure. He wanted to shake it off, but he couldn't.

The man repeated the process with his other limbs, securing them with rope before standing up behind Hyungwon, looping his arms under Hyungwon's and lifting him.

Hyungwon felt all of his limbs grow exponentially heavy, and now in his field of vision were bags of rocks, tied to his ankles and wrists, assuring that he'd never be able to move them. He wanted to cry out for help, but there were no witnesses save the stars that had never stopped to glance back at him, still fleeing, abandoning him.

The blades of grass tickling his soles turned into pebbles turned into the infinite coldness of water not touched by the sun.

"Almost there," the man promised. His words were so warm, so happy. Hyungwon wanted to believe them, wanted to think that they were good.

But the water climbed up to his thighs, then his waist, circling his bare skin, snapping at the exposed flesh with frigid teeth, each bite latching onto him, claiming him. The deeper he was dragged, the harder the jaws closed, never to let go.

"You're free now," the man promised, stopping. The water was up to Hyungwon's collarbone, caressing his fragile form, whispering promises of a shared eternity.

And then the promise was fulfilled, and he was released from the man's arms. His eyes glimpsed the negligent stars for the last time before his vision blurred, and then the water slipping over his head, embracing him, comforting him, subduing him, ripping at him, dragging him, silencing him.

And so Hyungwon sank, the rocks leading him, to a bed on the floor of the lake where the stars had abandoned him and the sun would not find him.


	79. Chapter 79

"Tell them what you told me," Changkyun said.

Hyungwon was bound to the bed once more, as Changkyun had momentarily left the room, but he hadn't struggled this time, only watched sadly as his freedom was restricted.

They were all gathered around the bed, watching Hyungwon intently. Shownu stood farthest back of them all, his eyes focused on Minhyuk's back instead of Hyungwon.

"I don't want to talk about it," Hyungwon said, his eyes meeting only Changkyun's.

Changkyun exhaled, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Hyungwon, you have to, okay? It's important."

Hyungwon shook his head, straining against the sheets. "I don't want to," he insisted, squeezing his eyes shut.

"What did you see, Skeleton?" Jooheon asked, impatient but not unsympathetic. He just didn't know how to handle the boy.

When he didn't respond, Changkyun stepped back in. "Did you see the moon, Hyungwon?"

Hyungwon stilled, latching on to the single detail. "Y-Yes, I saw the moon. And stars. There were stars."

"Were you at the lake again?"

Hyungwon burst into tears.

But Changkyun couldn't give up. They were so close to finding answers. "And you saw him. Dr. Irving, right? That's what you said earlier, Hyungwon."

Hyungwon nodded, his eyes still shut as he squirmed beneath the tight sheets. "My arms feel heavy," he said. "I can't move my arms, I can't move my legs. They're too heavy. Why can't I move them? They're too heavy, I can't move them-"

"What happened after you saw Dr. Irving?" Changkyun continued, biting his lip. He still remembered Kihyun's mental breakdown, when he'd begun ranting and repeating himself to the point where he had to be sedated.

"They're too heavy," Hyungwon cried. "I can't move them. I can't- I can't move them. Why are they so heavy?"

Jooheon nudged Changkyun, whispering in his ear, "What are we supposed to do?"

"We need to sedate him," Changkyun said, his eyes sad. "He's too worked up."

"How the hell are we supposed to do that?" Jooheon asked. "I don't keep a tranquilizer in my kitchen."

"You have sleeping pills, don't you?" Changkyun asked.

Jooheon stared at him. "You're saying that we should drug Hyungwon?"

Changkyun looked down in shame. "I don't know that there's any other option. He's spiraling Jooheon. His brain can't handle the trauma."

Jooheon paused before giving a sharp nod and leaving the bedroom.

"-heavy," Hyungwon kept mumbling, eyes still shut, tears still streaming.

"Why are they heavy?" Changkyun asked, trying to keep Hyungwon distracted until they could sedate him.

"The rocks," Hyungwon cried.

Changkyun grew still, a shiver running across his body.

"They're weighing me down. I can't move my arms or legs, they're so heavy. The rocks are too heavy, I can't move."

Now Changkyun was beginning to realize why Hyungwon hadn't wanted to talk about it.

Jooheon entered the room with a cup of water and two white pills. He nodded to Changkyun, who took the water, before circling to the other side of the bed.

The others just watched on in silence.

"Open your mouth, Hyungwon," Changkyun said, but when the crying boy shook his head, Changkyun had to force his mouth open, his thumb pushing open the right side of Hyungwon's mouth while his index and middle fingers pushed open the left. Hyungwon made incomprehensible sounds of protest, but Changkyun steeled himself to his resistance and nodded at Jooheon, who deposited the pills in Hyungwon's mouth.

Changkyun poured some water in, which Hyungwon immediately tried to spit out, but Changkyun poured a little more in, shutting and holding his mouth closed. He could feel Hyungwon struggling against his grip, fighting against swallowing, before his body required air. He choked down the pills, convulsing in Changkyun's arms, and Changkyun let go.

Hyungwon coughed several times as his tears ran harder down the side of his face.

Jooheon's expression was blank.

Changkyun didn't know what expression he himself was wearing.

Within minutes, the combination of sleeping pills and exhaustive crying had rendered Hyungwon unconscious.

Changkyun didn't know which horrified him more: Hyungwon's recounting of the stones weighing his body down, or what he'd just been forced to do to his friend.


	80. Chapter 80

"That was fucked up," Jooheon said once they were outside the room. His voice was softer than normal, and he was shaking. He didn't know what to do with his hands.

Changkyun didn't say anything. There was no response that could adequately represent how he felt.  _He_  didn't even know how he felt. His mind was numb, resounding only with the weighted echoes of guilt.

"There wasn't any other way," he said after a moment. It felt like someone else was saying the words. His lips were as numb as his mind. He wasn't sure how they'd know which sounds to make.

"He didn't want that," Minhyuk said quietly. "He resisted. You forced him to swallow the pills. He didn't have a choice."

"You saw how he was getting," Changkyun defended. "Remember what happened to Kihyun? It just escalated until they had to inject him with something."

"Yeah, but we're not the institute," Minhyuk said. He was watching Changkyun with disappointed eyes. "We're never supposed to do that to each other." He clenched his fists.

Changkyun realized the disappointment in Minhyuk's eyes was directed equally at himself for not stepping in.

"I know," Changkyun whispered, squeezing his eyes shut.

When he was a boy and he'd first come to know of the monsters' existence, he'd close his eyes really tightly to make it all go away.

But he wasn't a boy anymore.

He opened his eyes to find the same apartment around him, concerned and quiet friends looking to him, to Jooheon, to the bedroom door.

"We won't do it again," Changkyun said. Not only because it felt so wrong, but because he didn't think he could ever force himself to hold someone's mouth open again. He could still feel the outline of the cup in his hand. "But we can't take care of him," he added. "We need to help him, and the only way we can do that is to finish this thing first. Maybe Hyungwon will stop having the dreams then."

"What are we supposed to do, just politely ask Dr. Irving out to lunch and file a formal complaint?" Wonho asked, his lip curling at the thought.

"I've got a better idea," Jooheon said, his eyes dark. "We grab him, strangle him, strip him down and bind his wrists and ankles with bags of rocks before dumping him in a lake that nobody will ever search."

They were all quiet.

They were all trying to find reasons to reject Jooheon's idea.

They were all failing.

"No," Changkyun said after a long (too-long) pause. "We can't do that. It's wrong."

"You want to talk about what's wrong?" Jooheon asked with a choked laugh. "That man killed Kihyun exactly that way. And maybe he didn't kill Hyungwon, but Hyungwon has seen it, has lived and died through it. Who's to say that if we hadn't kept looking, we wouldn't have found another body of another boy, weighed down by rocks? And another? And another?" The pain in his eyes solidified into blood lust. "He's a bad man, Changkyun. And nobody's going to do anything about him, unless we do."

"We don't kill people," Changkyun insisted firmly, leveling his gaze with Jooheon's. "We'll find another way."

Jooheon was quiet, his eyes warring with Changkyun's before he raised his chin. "Let's take a small break, yeah?"

Changkyun exhaled sharply before nodding and heading to the kitchen. He went to get a glass of water to calm his nerves when he thought back to Hyungwon, and he rested his shaking hand on the counter top instead.

_He'd just woken up from an extremely graphic and realistic dream about sinking underwater, and you tried to get him to drink water? You idiot._

"It's not your fault," Minhyuk said, having followed him into the kitchen, and Changkyun turned, his eyes focusing on Jooheon and Wonho's figures beyond the door frame before dropping down to Minhyuk. "You would never mean to hurt Hyungwon. We all know that."

Changkyun closed his eyes, shaking his head before sighing and opening them. "But I  _did_  hurt him. Did you see the look in his eyes? That panic?" Changkyun clenched his jaw. "That look was because of me. Not Irving, not Kihyun. Me."

"Hyungwon knows you wouldn't hurt him either." Minhyuk took a step closer, laying a hand on Changkyun's shoulder. "He hasn't been himself lately, we all know that. And it hasn't been easy on you, trying to take care of him. You're doing a great job, Changkyun. There's no one I would trust with him more."

"That's not always enough."

"But sometimes it is."

Wonho entered the kitchen, looking first to Changkyun, then Minhyuk, then back to Changkyun as though he'd realized that he'd interrupted something. "I...just wanted to let you know that Jooheon and I are going to head out for a bit." He paused. "Do you guys want us to pick up anything while we're out? Food? Or...anything?"

"No," Changkyun said, shaking his head. He didn't think he could stomach anything just yet.

"Ice cream?" Minhyuk asked hopefully.

Wonho smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes. "I'll try to grab some," he said before he left the kitchen. The door shut a few moments later.  
  
***

Later, Changkyun would ask himself if he'd known what was going to happen, and then he'd ask himself if he should have stopped it.


	81. Chapter 81

Wonho and Jooheon didn't get back until the early hours of the morning. Despite the time, they seemed neither tired nor restless.

Hyungwon was still asleep, as were Shownu and Minhyuk.

Changkyun was not.

He stood up as they walked in and met them in the kitchen.

He stared at them for a moment. "Where's the ice cream?" he asked, his voice low.

Wonho stared back at him for a long moment. "We must have forgotten it. Sorry."

Changkyun was silent, and despite no one saying anything, they all stayed where they were, still, silent. "It's pretty easy to forget something you were never planning on doing," he agreed after a moment.

Wonho twitched, but Jooheon didn't react.

"There's a scratch on your face, Wonho. It looks painful. It's new, isn't it?"

No response.

"And your shoes look muddy," Changkyun commented casually, looking down at their footwear before looking back up at their faces, scanning for any tells. "Since you weren't off buying ice cream, what exactly were you two doing?"

Wonho opened his mouth to craft another lie, but Jooheon took a step closer, moving in front of Wonho as he spoke.

"We buried our friend, and then we fixed the problem," he said, his voice low and even.

Changkyun didn't let his face give anything away. "There are lots of problems. I'm not sure which one you're referring to."

"I'm talking about the one who murdered and molested mentally-disturbed, troubled boys who had no one left in the world to protect them," Jooheon said, his voice still the same volume. He wasn't nervous or twitchy; instead, he spoke with a cool confidence, his words factual rather than arrogant.

"That problem," Changkyun said. He looked down for a moment, dropping the charade they'd been playing. "How did you kill him?"

"I had Wonho contact the guard who got you and Hyungwon out. He lured Irving into the parking lot. Then Wonho and I threw him in the back of the truck and drove to the lake."

"And?" Changkyun asked, looking up. He was scared at the fact that what he was hearing didn't really affect him. "Did you strangle him, strip him, weigh him down with rocks, dump him in the lake?"

"Maybe," Jooheon said, tilting his head. A small smile crossed his lips, one that wouldn't ever quite fade from Changkyun's mind. "Or maybe he wasn't dead when we let him sink." Jooheon shrugged, an innocent look crossing his face, but Changkyun couldn't forget the expression he'd seen. "My memory isn't so great. Maybe that's what happens when I forget to take my pills for a few days." He yawned before smiling at Changkyun. "We'd better get some sleep. It's pretty late, isn't it?" He chuckled. "Or early, technically. Good night, Changkyun. Or good morning."

He walked past Changkyun out of the kitchen, Wonho following closely behind, and Changkyun didn't stop them.

He knew that what they'd done was wrong, but...

He couldn't quite bring it in himself to condemn them.

And shame. He felt ashamed that he'd been too cowardly to take part, but the thought of doing that to a person, even a bad person, made his stomach twist and turn within him.

The soft padding of sock-enveloped feet on the kitchen floor alerted him to someone's presence. He turned to see Wonho, hesitating in the door frame.

"You're aren't going to sleep?" Wonho asked softly.

Changkyun paused. "No, I don't think so."

"I don't think I can, either," Wonho admitted, sitting down at the kitchen table and rolling his lips inward, pressing his teeth down lightly on the delicate flesh.

Changkyun nodded but didn't take a seat.

"What are you thinking about?" Wonho asked some time later. Maybe a minute, maybe ten. Time had become inconsequential in the grand scheme of things.

"About how much Hyungwon is going to hate me," Changkyun admitted, not speaking directly to Wonho but rather addressing the kitchen ceiling.

"He won't hate you," Wonho said after a moment, looking down at the table. "I don't think he can." Changkyun hummed but didn't reply. "Do you think...he hates me?"

Changkyun still didn't look at Wonho. He found it difficult for some reason. Maybe because he knew what the boy had done. "Why did you do it?" he asked after a moment. "Why did you kill Irving?"

Wonho was quiet.

"Was it for Kihyun?"

Wonho shifted in his seat.

"Or for Hyungwon?"

"I felt like I owed it to him. Hyungwon," Wonho said, his voice quiet, and still, Changkyun didn't look at him. "I've let him down so many times. And I thought, if I did this, maybe...maybe it would mean something."

"And? Does it?"

Wonho's answer was soft and honest. "I don't know."

The two sat there in silence while the early morning shifted into simply morning.

Then Changkyun picked up the phone and, although his fingers trembled, he spoke in a smooth voice. "Yes, I'd like to admit a new patient."


	82. END

"They said- the doctor said I can leave next week," came the soft but warm voice from inside the room.

"That's good, Hyungwonnie," a smooth voice responded. "You've done such a great job."

"Do you really think so?"

"I know so, hyung. I'm proud of you."

"You are?"

"I am." The creaking of a chair as someone stood up. "I have to go now, hyung, but I'll see you when you get out next week, okay?"

"Do you have to go so soon?" Hyungwon's voice turned thin and needy.

"I'm sorry, hyung, I do. But I'll see you next week, okay?"

"Okay." A pause. "Thank you for coming to see me."

"Of course."

The door marked  _119W, Chae Hyungwon_  opened, and a thin figure stepped out, shutting the door softly behind himself before turning to find five pairs of eyes on him.

"We're...Hyungwon's friends," Changkyun said, stepping forward and nodding his head forward respectfully. "We were hoping that we could visit him."

The boy stared at them with unreadable eyes. He was similar to Hyungwon in many ways; like the other boy, he had a tall, lanky frame, and he seemed to possess a quiet, contemplative demeanor. "Chae Kyungwon," he responded after a moment. "Hyungwon is my older brother."

Changkyun gave a tight smile. "It's nice to meet you, Kyungwon-ah."

Kyungwon stared at Changkyun for a long moment. "You're Changkyun, yes?"

Changkyun blinked, somewhat startled. "I- yes, I'm Changkyun."

Kyungwon slowly turned to scan the others, imprinting their faces into his memory. "And you must be Jooheon," he addressed next. "Hoseok. Minhyuk. Shownu."

They all nodded, surprised.

"He talks about you all sometimes," Kyungwon said, but as before, his face showed little to no expression. "And another one. Kihyun. But he's not here, is here?"

Changkyun swallowed, unsure as to how much Kyungwon knew, and he decided to play it safe by diverting the topic. "How is Hyungwon doing?"

Kyungwon thought for a second before shrugging. "I'm sure you understand why it can be hard to tell."

"He said he was being released next week though, right? That's a good sign, isn't it?"

Kyungwon stared at Changkyun for a long time before nodding slowly. "Maybe you think of it that way."

Changkyun hesitated, unsure exactly how to approach this cold stranger. "Um, well...can we see him? We've tried visiting earlier, but they said his room was only accessible to family until now, so-"

"You're the one who admitted him, right?" Kyungwon interrupted, and Changkyun stopped speaking, somewhat shocked.

"I- yes, yes, I...I asked that they accept him into their program," Changkyun admitted slowly before he felt the need to justify his actions. "He wasn't doing well, Kyungwon. We weren't able to help him. He just kept getting worse, and...we just didn't have any other options."

Kyungwon was quiet for a bit. "You know, our parents still think he's at the other institution. They still send a check every month."

Changkyun opened his mouth but had no response.

"Are you the one paying for him to be here?" Kyungwon asked directly, and Changkyun paused before nodding.

"Yes, we all pitch in and-"

"You can stop doing that."

Changkyun tensed, standing up a bit taller. "Kyungwon, please, you might not understand, but Hyungwon really does need help that only trained medical staff can-"

"I didn't say I was having him removed. I'll pay for his treatment. I'm his blood," Kyungwon said.

Changkyun thought briefly of the blood that tied them all together but said nothing of it. "All right. Thank you, Kyungwon."

Kyungwon nodded before shifting slightly, and Changkyun sensed that the conversation was almost over. "His visiting hours are over for today. I'm afraid you can't see him."

"Oh," Changkyun responded, trying to mask his disappointment from Kyungwon, who gave no reaction.

"You should come next week," Kyungwon suggested instead. "10:00 AM. His visiting hours end at noon. That should be enough time, yes?"

Changkyun hesitated before nodding. "Yes, that's- thank you, Kyungwon."

"I haven't done anything," Kyungwon said, looking down, and for the first time in the conversation, Changkyun wondered if he was speaking of something else, something more. But then he looked up with his emotionless eyes and nodded at them before turning and walking down the hallway, even, measured steps, not too fast, not too slow. Changkyun sensed that Kyungwon knew they were watching him but that he didn't care either way.

When at last he disappeared, Changkyun turned to the others behind him who had remained quiet. "One more week. One more week until we get to see Hyungwon again."

***

9:45 AM the following week, the five of them lined the hallway once more, waiting for Kyungwon to appear.

At 9:58, said boy approached, strolling down the hallway with familiarity only earned with time and repetition. It was clear to Changkyun that the boy made weekly visits, but given his somewhat cold demeanor, Changkyun couldn't exactly figure out why.

Kyungwon stopped in front of Changkyun and stared at him for a moment before nodding and, without addressing them, moving to the door. He opened it softly and entered the room, leaving it open behind him, and Changkyun hesitated before following, the others entering behind him. Shownu was last, but he hesitated at the threshold, nodded respectfully toward Changkyun, and closed the door, choosing to remain outside.

Changkyun thought he knew why, but he'd been hoping that Shownu would have forgiven himself by this point. It had been several months since Hyungwon had been admitted into the new institution, and he'd thought that Shownu coming at all had been a sign. He'd been wrong.

Changkyun turned his head to look back at the room's sole occupant only to find that he'd been looking at Changkyun.

A smile spread across Hyungwon's face, small at first, but growing bit by bit until his eyes crinkled and his face was lit up. "You came," Hyungwon said before looking at the others. His smile faded slightly. "But where's Shownu-hyung?"

"He's in the hallway," Changkyun offered. "He's...not feeling well."

"Oh." Hyungwon was quiet. "And where's Kihyun?"

Changkyun hesitated longer this time. He couldn't be sure as to whether Hyungwon believed Kihyun to be alive, or if Hyungwon wanted to know where they'd buried him. "He's...in a safe place," Changkyun said. "You can meet him when you get out."

Hyungwon's face lit up once more. "That's right, did Kyungwonnie tell you?" Hyungwon tilted his head slightly, a worn but proud smile on his lips. "I can go home next week!"

"That's-" Changkyun hesitated, looking over at Kyungwon, who was staring back at him with a blank expression. "That's...that's great, Hyungwon. That's really exciting. We're so glad to hear that you're doing well."

Hyungwon nodded, looking up at Changkyun shyly. "Thank you for...for helping me get help. I feel much better."

From the side of Hyungwon's bed, Jooheon grinned. "Look at you now, looking all cute. You weren't this cute before, Skeleton. Right guys?" he asked, looking around, and the others laughed.

Changkyun had to admit, though, that Hyungwon  _did_ look much healthier when he wasn't underweight and riddled with crippling paranoia.

"And the dreams are gone," Hyungwon said, looking down with a smile smile at his clasped hands before he began twisting the bracelet on his right wrist in circles. The small text  _ **Patient: Chae Hyungwon; Age: 18; Condition:**  _slowly vanished, replaced with more details as he continued twisting.

He looked up at Wonho, who froze before forcing a smile. "That's- that's great, Hyungwon."

"Thank you," Hyungwon said. Changkyun didn't know if Hyungwon was thanking Wonho for the compliment or for his part in making the dreams cease.

He didn't know a lot of things about Hyungwon any more.

"How is your mom doing?" he asked Minhyuk, turning to his friend with a gentle smile, eyebrows raised in sincere curiosity, and Minhyuk inhaled sharply before smiling.

He'd secretly always felt like a bad friend toward Hyungwon, but Hyungwon had some unexplainable ability to make each person feel unique and special and appreciated. "She's doing better, thanks," Minhyuk said, shuffling his feet. "But I moved out."

Hyungwon's small gasp caused Minhyuk to look up abruptly only to see a proud smile bloom on Hyungwon's face. He seemed to have plenty of smiles now. "That's amazing, Minhyuk. I always knew you could do it."

Minhyuk nodded, biting his lip, but he couldn't abandon the insecurities accompanying his decision.

"It doesn't mean that you love her any less," Hyungwon added, and Minhyuk's eyes grew large before he nodded slowly. "But you have to take care of yourself sometimes too."

Minhyuk's eyes watered, and he quickly nodded, mumbling something before looking away from Hyungwon's kind eyes.

Hyungwon continued to ask each of them about their lives; Jooheon, about how he was working to support himself and his mother, who had found a man who treated her right, even though they weren't engaged yet; Wonho, who had spent time slowly recovering his identity and eventually remembering fragments of his time in the fugue state; Changkyun, about his mom and her boyfriend (whom Changkyun still despised, but he'd realized that he wasn't a first priority for his mom now and that he might never be).

The two hours passed by altogether too quickly, but Changkyun was glad to see that Hyungwon seemed much more at peace than any time he'd seen him before.

They were all filing out of the room when Hyungwon called his name.

"Changkyun, can I talk to you for a second?"

Changkyun looked to Kyungwon for permission, and upon receiving a nod, he went to Hyungwon's bedside and waited for the boy to talk.

"I'm very grateful to you for all that you've done for me," Hyungwon said softly, looking down. "And I just want you to know that. I don't hold anything against you. You made the decisions you had to in order to look out for me, and not everyone is able to do that. And I'm sorry. I know it must have been hard for you."

Changkyun, for the first time that morning, felt tears pricking at his eyes. He was grateful that Hyungwon was still looking down. He didn't like crying, and he didn't like other people seeing him cry. "I'm so sorry," he whispered. "When I forced you to swallow those pills-"

"You were trying to help me. I know that," Hyungwon said, looking up and smiling gently before lifting his unbound hands, his thumbs caressing Changkyun's tears. "I forgive you, Kyun. Not that there's anything to forgive."

Changkyun spent another minute crying before murmuring a goodbye, and then he was stepping out of Hyungwon's room and into the hallway. He sniffled before running a finger beneath both his eyes, and to their credit, none of the others called him on it.

After taking a shaky breath, he turned to Kyungwon and addressed the question that had been bugging him. "I thought he was being released today?"

Kyungwon's lips twitched before he spoke. "Come back next week," was all he said, and then as before, he strode off down the hallway.

Changkyun stared after him, lost, before turning back to the others. "We made the right decision, right? He seemed so..."

"Happy."

"Cheerful."

"Untroubled."

Shownu was quiet. He didn't know how Hyungwon had seemed, but the others' descriptions lightened his heart a bit.

Changkyun nodding, smiling to the floor before looking up at the others. "We'll meet back here next week? Sound good?"

The others nodded and went their separate ways.


	83. EPILOGUE

"Hi, Hyungwon, how are you feeling today?" Changkyun asked, smiling as he took a seat next to Hyungwon's bed.

Hyungwon smiled at him, still the same peaceful, innocent smile as before, and Changkyun took one of Hyungwon's hands in his own, playing with the bracelet around Hyungwon's wrist.

**_Patient: Chae Hyungwon_ **

"I'm feeling really good today, Kyun," Hyungwon said, followed by a soft giggle. "And guess what?"

**_Age: 24_ **

"The doctor said I could go home next week!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for reading! Please check out my profile for other works.

**Author's Note:**

> Please support my search for happiness: ko-fi.com/nobodyimportant


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